Shooting: All or nothing for the trap pairs

The first shots in shooting's bid for medal glory will be fired around Melbourne this morning.

New Zealand's competitors carry Sparc's expectations of a 10-plus medal haul, and the pressure will be on across the disciplines led by Teresa Borrell and Nadine Stanton in the trap pairs final.

But with just three combinations entered, there will be no room for error as only a gold medal will be at stake.

Greg Yelavich, already New Zealand's most successful Commonwealth Games athlete in terms of medals collected, gets an early opportunity to add to his 10-medal haul when he joins Alan Earle in the 50m pistol pairs.

"Having such predictions [from Sparc] does make life difficult," said shooting manager Tony Waymouth.

"But our philosophy is we are going out to do our best.

"We are not going to get screwed up about numbers."

The funding incentives from the national agency obviously weigh heavily but will not sway the shooters in their endeavours to again figure highly in the medal count.

The men's hockey team, rated outside the medals by the betting agencies, face a tough first-up test against England today.

The men's bowls pair of Rowan Brassey and Jamie Hill have a similarly testing first round clash with Australia in their only game today.

Most interest at cycling's velodrome tonight will be Greg Henderson's return to the stage where he won his world scratch title a couple of years ago.

He is joined by Hayden Roulston and Richard Bowker in a strong New Zealand challenge in the points race.