Orders don't get much taller.

During June, 11 Tasmanians were named on the Australian team for Birmingham, joining five previously announced - although debate rages whether NSW-born, Hobart-based Tassie Tigers cricketer Nicola Carey qualifies as Tasmanian or not.

For the sake of argument, and certainly this column, we'll call it 16 because that matches the state's contingent on the Gold Coast four years ago.

Looking back now, those long, sun-drenched days of late summer 2018 - in a more innocent time when nobody knew what the word COVID meant - represent a golden era in Tasmanian sport, in every respect.

In fact, they probably justify digging out the adjective 'halcyon'.

Between them, the 16 Tasmanians who mirrored the state's traditional winter migration to the Sunshine State returned home with 12 gold medals and four silver.

At the risk of exposing my suspect mathematics, that's an average somewhere around one medal each, give or take.

Obviously, it rather helps a state medal haul to possess an individual like freestyle swimmer Ariarne Titmus whose collection of three gold (400m, 800m and 4x200m) and one silver (200m) would place her 17^th on the overall medal table, between Botswana and Samoa.

However, track cyclist Amy Cure (team pursuit and scratch race) and lawn bowler Rebecca Van Asch (fours and triples) could also lay claim to being multiple gold medallists while triathlete Jake Birtwhistle's contribution of team gold and individual silver leaves minimal room for improvement at his second Games.

Having two members of victorious teams in both basketball (Chris Goulding and Lucas Walker) and hockey (Eddie Ockenden and Jeremy Edwards) completed the golden haul while weightlifter Kaity Fassina and javelin thrower Hamish Peacock contributed the other silvers.

Titmus, Van Asch, Birtwhistle and Ockenden all return, along with a trio of fellow Tasmanians keen to improve on their debut showings.

The onus of expectation presents differing loads on the shoulders of that golden quartet.

At his fourth Commonwealth Games - and alongside fellow Toyko Olympian Josh Beltz at his first - Ockenden is only too aware that the Kookaburras have won every men's hockey tournament in Commonwealth Games history - a phenomenal sequence stretching back into the last century. No pressure there then.

In contrast, Van Asch and her Jackaroos teammates are motivated by the knowledge that Australia has never won a lawn bowls gold medal at a Commonwealth Games in the Northern Hemisphere.

Riverside Aquatic Centre alumni Titmus and Birtwhistle, meanwhile, will be targeting similar medal returns albeit without the significant advantage of home territory and support.

By their own high standards, track cyclist Georgia Baker and runners Stewart McSweyn and Jack Hale would hope to upgrade their Gold Coast results in Birmingham.

Hale came closest to a medal with a fourth place in the 4x100m relay and returns in the same event along with fellow Hobartian Jacob Despard.

McSweyn returned respectable results of fifth and 11^th in the 5000 and 10,000m respectively four years ago but has since reset his focus to the shorter 1500m on a Birmingham track he knows well.

Squeezed out of the victorious team pursuit line-up at the Anna Meares Velodrome, Baker's 2018 involvement was limited to 21^st place in the points race.

Since the retirements of Cure and South Australian medal regular Annette Edmondson, Baker has assumed a senior role within the women's endurance team and could be expected to compete in up to three events - team pursuit, madison and scratch race - being a solid medal chance in each.

The dual Olympian's current form on bitumen, where she won a stage of the Thuringen Ladies Tour and occupied a podium place in the Giro d'Italia, could even see her play a role in the women's road race.

Despite making his Commonwealth Games debut, Josh Duffy is also a medal contender as the specialist starter in a team pursuit quartet overhauled in the wake of a frustrating and disappointing Olympic showing.

Tasmanian-raised, Queensland-based diver Emily Meaney and para swimmer Jacob Templeton, mountain biker Sam Fox, para-triathlete Erica Burleigh and guide Hayden Armstrong are also set to debut and complete the Tasmanian contingent for the Games which will run from July 28 to August 8.

Similarities between Gold Coast and Birmingham do not come easily to hand, except maybe in their shared love of canals.

Not many surfers would describe the English Midlands as paradise while a settlement dating back to 8000BC somewhat pre-dates one only given its current name in 1958. And don't even think about comparing the climates.

However, in Tasmanian terms, the cities represent adjacent stops - albeit 16,605km apart - on a Commonwealth Games involvement considerably more proud and distinguished than was suggested by being left off the home nation's own map at the opening ceremony for the 1982 edition in Brisbane.