BY Aileen Campbell MSP

FOUR years ago, Scotland stood as one. The city of Glasgow swelled with colour, compassion and celebration, the people of our great nation beamed with pride at the extraordinary feats of achievement reached by our inspirational athletes.

On the opening night back in July 2014, the eyes of the world fell upon us and we responded as only we know how. The Commonwealth Games in Scotland was a triumph from start to finish and demonstrated just why we are the best wee country in the world.

While not Sports Minister at the time, I had the privilege of breathing in the excitement and honour which befell so many of us during a wonderful fortnight of sport. Representing the government, I saw first-hand the work that went into making it the best Commonwealth Games yet. From the volunteers behind the scenes guiding tourists through our streets, to the teary-eyed athletes atop the podium with a gold medal hanging around their neck.

It was a poignant moment to watch this with my little boy Angus, who was just three and a half at the time, and wonder if one day it could even be him up there. One of my highlights at Glasgow 2014 was having the privilege of presenting Scottish sprinter Libby Clegg with her quaich at her medal ceremony after she won T12 100m gold and that was an incredible experience.

Every single one of the venues had fantastic atmospheres and the buzz around Glasgow was unbelievable - I’d never experienced anything like that in the city before.

Regarding the legacy of Glasgow 2014, I believe we have a lot to be proud of. We now have a wealth of Community Sports Hubs the length and breadth of the country delivering sport and activities to people. There are currently more than 180 hubs and we plan to increase the number even further.

Many of our governing bodies are doing a great job in developing sport. And the investment in facilities in Glasgow has enabled the city to become a real destination for high-profile sporting events, with the perfect example being the Glasgow 2018 European Championships, which we’ll be turning our attention to as soon as Gold Coast 2018 is over.

So on many levels, there has been a real, tangible legacy to Glasgow hosting the Commonwealth Games four years ago and there’s been great things done with the investment around the Games which has given so many people greater opportunity to become involved in sport. But we must not get complacent and we have to make sure we keep building because there are so many lessons we learned from Glasgow 2014.

I’m in Gold Coast for a week so I’ll be speaking to people in Team Scotland about what we felt we did well in Glasgow and things we felt like we could have done differently or improved on. But I’m so proud to also have the opportunity to talk to other nations about the success we made of the Commonwealth Games.

The success of Team Scotland in Glasgow was incredible too - the athletes had considerable pressure on them but they delivered when it really mattered. I believe that success gave sport throughout Scotland a huge boost but what was so encouraging was the boost resonated throughout the whole of Scottish sport - governing bodies’ membership figures have increased and many sports have improved as a whole as a result of Glasgow 2014.

It’s not all about elite sport either, with governing bodies taking their social responsibility very seriously; they’re not just focusing on the elite side of sport, they’re also looking at how sport can boost society as a whole.

Going forward, I want us as a country to continue to use sport to enhance communities and to be a real force on the world stage on the elite side of things.

But over the next couple of weeks, we’ll have the privilege of watching Team Scotland hopefully excel in so many sports. This is the biggest team that Scotland has sent to an overseas Commonwealth Games and the target is to win the most medals at an overseas Games and I’m optimistic that we can achieve this. And this is the largest female contingent travelling to a Commonwealth Games which highlights our progress regarding equality issues.

From a constituency point of view, I’m looking forward to watching the netball because one of Team Scotland’s players, Emily Nicholl, is from Biggar, my home town. Recently, I did an event at a primary school with Eilish McColgan so it will be great to see her run and I’m looking forward to seeing if Ross Murdoch can defend his title.

There’s so many athletes who I can’t wait to see, which is an indication of how strong Scotland is as a sporting nation these days. Everyone will make us proud.