Australia win women's 4x200m freestyle gold in Paris

Ariarne Titmus swam Australia's last leg in the women's 4x200m freestyle win in Paris.

Australia's women's 4x200m freestyle relay team have won the nation's eighth gold medal at the Paris Olympics.

The Dolphins' team of Mollie O'Callaghan, Lani Pallister, Brianna Throssell and Ariarne Titmus were never headed in their resounding victory on Thursday night.

The quartet saluted in seven minutes 40.33 seconds, an Olympic record, to win by 2.78 seconds from the United States, with China taking bronze.

O'Callaghan now has three golds in Paris - she featured in the victorious women's 4x100m freestyle team and won the 200m freestyle - and now has five golds in her Olympic career.

Titmus, who last Saturday night won the 400m freestyle, has two golds in Paris and four gold medals in her Olympic career.

The relay victory is the first Olympic gold for Pallister, who is making her debut at the sporting showpiece and recovered from a bout of COVID-19 which forced her to withdraw from the 1500m freestyle earlier in the Games.

Throssell is now a dual Olympic gold medallist, but this was her first swim in a winning final - she was a heat swimmer in Australia's triumphant women's 4x100m medley team at the Tokyo Games three years ago.

Australia's swim team have won five of the nation's eight golds in Paris.

The 4x200m team join Australia's women's 4x100m freestyle relayers, Titmus (women's 400m freestyle), O'Callaghan (women's 200m freestyle) and Kaylee McKeown (women's 100m backstroke) as swimming gold medallists in Paris.

Earlier Thursday night, Kaylee McKeown produced another strong backstroke swim to remain on track in her quest to become the first woman to win a consecutive 100m-200m backstroke titles at the Olympics.

McKeown was second-quickest through the 200m backstroke semi-finals. She successfully defended her title over the shorter distance on Tuesday night.

And veteran Cam McEvoy has confirmed his status as gold-medal favourite for the men's 50m freestyle.

The 30-year-old, the first Australian man to swim at four Olympics, was equal-fastest through the 50m free semi-finals in 21.38 seconds, the same time as Great Britain's Ben Proud.

Australia's Olympic debutant Liz Dekkers finished fourth in the women's 200m butterfly final won by Canada's Summer McIntosh.

The 20-year-old Dekkers touched in 2:07.11, some 4.08 seconds behind McIntosh, and teammate and fellow first-timer at an Olympics Abbey Lee Connor (2:08.15) was seventh.

Dolphins duo William Petric and Thomas Neill failed to advance from the men's 200m individual medley semi-finals - they were ranked 10th and 11 respectively.

In finals not featuring Australians, Hungary's Hubert Kos (men's 200m backstroke) and American Kate Douglass (women's 200m breaststroke) won gold.