Matt Girard flies the Guernsey flag in Pune. (Picture by Paul Guillou, 0657486)

AS THE Guernsey team made its way back from the Commonwealth Youth Games, the long flight home gave the team managers the opportunity to reflect on the performance.

Obviously, they were pleased to see Guernsey finish in 13th position out of 71 countries.

The Commonwealth Games Federation uses the same format as the official Olympics table for its medal table, based on the number of golds that were won.

Even if the American approach (which placed the USA top of all countries at the Beijing Olympics) of adding the total number of medals is used, Guernsey place 22nd.

For the record, Jersey were among the 38 countries that did not win a medal.

However, there is even better news when Sarnians look at the alternative medals table, which takes into account golds per head of the population.

Guernsey finished top of that with one per 61,811, ahead of Grenada in second place with a gold medal per 110,000 and Samoa in third place with one per 185,000.