Moment Mexican diver scores ZERO points with dive branded ‘terrible’ by BBC pundit after failed appeal in Olympics 3m springboard qualifiers

Mexican diver Aranza Vazquez’s Olympic dream turned into a nightmare after a disastrous attempt on the 3-meter springboard.

Vazquez, 21, started Thursday’s competition well, finishing seventh after her third dive and on course to reach tomorrow’s 3m springboard final.

However, on her fourth dive of the day, she attempted a pair of backflips at a difficulty level of 3.0, but went completely wrong after misjudging her takeoff.

When she hit the water, Vazquez ended up in an unnatural position on her back. It looked like an extremely painful impact with the pool.

Vazquez immediately put her hand in the air as she came out of the water, signifying diving, and saying she wanted to talk to the referee.

Vazquez was in seventh place and on course to qualify for the final before making her fourth attempt

Vazquez did it all wrong and received an extremely painful blow with the water on her back

The Mexican attempted to appeal the decision after claiming she was distracted

She then walked up to the officer and claimed she was distracted.

The referee then spoke to his assistant, who after a lengthy discussion decided that her appeal would be dismissed.

This meant that Vazquez, who also competed at the last Olympic Games in Tokyo, recorded a disastrous score of 0.0, dashing her hopes of a place in the final.

The 21-year-old looked sad and was later seen in tears as she was comforted by her coach before walking onto the podium at the Olympic venue.

Responding to the dive in commentary for the BBC, expert and former diver Leon Taylor said: ‘Disastrous dive, you could see this was going to happen.

“She holds her hand up, which means she wants to talk to the referee. If the referee finds the complaint justified, he will allow a restart.

‘Otherwise, if he thinks it is not fair, a bit like the false starts in athletics, you can run under protest, but in diving there is no such thing.’

Discussing the “horrible” dive and the judges’ decision to deny her appeal, Taylor added: “She’s off to a terrible start. The caveat is that if you make a dive like that, it counts.

If you want to risk it, you could say something happened in the crowd that scared me off.

“I don’t know what the complaint is, so I can’t really comment on its validity. I didn’t see any flashes, but I’m not on the diving board either.

“It’s not really controversial, I think it’s a great decision.”

Tonia Couch, a Commonwealth silver medallist and former diver, added on the BBC: ‘It’s really unfortunate for her. It’s really tough.’

If the referee had found her complaints justified, Vazquez would have been allowed to redo her dive.

This happened during the 2012 London Olympics, when Tom Daley was allowed to dive again after lightning appeared to strike as he stepped up to dive, with officials believing he was distracted.

Vazquez tried to plead her case to the referee, but unfortunately for her, the appeal was denied

The 21-year-old was devastated by the decision, which saw her miss the final.

Unfortunately for Vazquez, she was not so lucky and fans expressed their condolences to the Mexican on social media.

One of them said: ‘Feel sad for Aranza Vazquez, although she was so promising, but she seemed to have slipped off the diving board at the last moment. I hope she recovers quickly from the disappointment!.’

Another added: ‘Very sad for the Mexican… with this mistake she was out of the final…’, before another fan joked: ‘Dramatic and sad!! Zero for Ara Vazquez. It costs her the ticket to the final!!!!’