A double-clear from individual European gold medallist Martin Fuchs and three total clears in the second round meant the team picked up its first win in their home country for over 22 years at the Grundenmoos Arena.

Despite being joint-second at the halfway stage with eight faults, a second-round collapse from Great Britain left them with a final score of 12 faults and saw Fuchs, Edouard Schmitz, Pius Schwizer and Steve Guerdat take home the gold medal in the season's first event.

Both Schmitz and Schwizer produced flawless second runs for Switzerland after mistakes in the first round.

"Whenever I was on the team in St Gallen we never won, but we said this year now we have to win, and finally we did it!" Fuchs said.

"We were confident because Edoaurd’s horse jumped really well and Pius’ horse too, and we changed his plan for the second round to put an extra stride in the last line."

The Netherlands finished runners-up as they posted the same final score as Great Britain but in a faster time.

St Gallen is the first of six events making up the 2022 Europe Division 1 series, with the next stage of the competition due to take place in Sopot in Poland next weekend.

Rounding off the competition is set to be the grand final at the Real Club de Polo in Barcelona, which is scheduled to take place from September 29 to October 2.