Two Scottish Champions Crowned and a Silver Medal at the UK Boccia Championships 

By William Moncrieff, Communications Coordinator 

Sunday the 17th of November saw the UK Boccia Championships conclude. The final day of the tournament had some fantastic boccia on display, with 39 players representing Scotland, England, Wales and Northern Ireland battling it out for medals.  

The seven strong Scottish squad featured in the BC2, BC3 and BC4 tournaments. Here is how they got on, on Sunday.  

Paul McIntyre (Forth Valley) took on Penny Froude in the BC4 playoff. After a closely fought match Penny came out victorious, defeating Paul 3 -2. Paul returned later on in the day in the 5th/6th place play off against fellow Scot, Tyler McLelland. It was an extremely close match, going to a tiebreak. Paul went on to win the tie break seeing him finish in 5th place overall (4-4) 

Tyler McLelland (Fife) kicked off his final day taking on Louis Saunders in the BC4 playoff. Narrowly losing 3-2, Tyler ended up finishing in  6th place in the BC4 after a hard fought match in the playoff. 

The day continued on for the McIntyre brothers with Scott taking on Jayne Milligan in the BC4 7th/8th place playoff. Unfortunately, Scott lost 7-8 in a close game, the Forth Valley boccia player will be returning home with an 8th place in the BC4. 

Alex Medley from Perth and Kinross won his final match of the week, 6 – 4 to see him cap off his championship with a 7th place finish in the BC2. 

Ayrshire’s Kayleigh Brown (nee Haggo) won her first match of the day against James Clowes (7-1) to advance through to the BC2 final, against Reshad Saraj. 

It was an intense final with the last ball deciding the medals. Reshad took the gold with Kayleigh settling for silver.  

Fellow Paris 2024 Paralympians – Patrick Wilson and Stephen McGuire – put on a cracking show in the BC3 and BC4 finals.  

After success in the semifinal (beating Sally Kidson 4-3), Paddy faced William Arnott in the BC3 final. As expected, it was a closely contested game but the Scot put in a stellar performance to bag his second UK Championship title of his career. 

After a 10 – 1 win over Penny Froude, Stephen faced Sophie Newnham in his final. Sophie made the Paralympic champion work hard in the BC4 final which proved to be yet another, very close and riveting face-off which came down to the last balls of play. A bit of luck was on Stephen’s side as he took the title, 3-2. 

Many thanks to all the athletes, assistants, coaches, officials, volunteers that made the Championships such a huge success.  

SDS would also like to say a huge thank you to all the event sponsors: Associated Seafoods Ltd, BioMar Ltd, Blackadders LLP, Blacks Haulage Solutions Ltd, Cefetra Ltd, Glenarm Organic Salmon, Inverlussa Marine Services, Loch Duart Ltd, LCL Shipping Ltd and Mowi Scotland. Without you, the UK Boccia Championships would not have been possible.  

If you missed the championships or would be interested in catching up on some of the action, you can watch the livestream from court three: day one and day two.