Smith looking cool at Boccia World Champs

Paralympic champion David Smith led the charge for Great Britain at the boccia World Championships as he won both in his BC1 pool matches in Liverpool.

Smith sailed through his group without dropping a single point after recording three wins from three.

A 15-0 victory over Thailand’s Subin Tipmanee this morning was followed up by a 4-0 win over the Bermudan Omar Hayward in the afternoon session, adding to his triumph over Sungjoon Jung yesterday.

And speaking after his first match, Smith provided some astute tactical insights in his approach to proceedings.

“It was good, she’s a good player,” he said. “I knew she would take me longer because it would be suicide to take me short, because I’ve got the power and she doesn’t.

“She’s pretty good long, but I just managed to get in on that first end to score that three points, and then obviously I had my end to go and I knew I always had it in control.

“Once I got the first end under my belt I was able to relax into in and enjoy myself.”

Elsewhere in the BC1 pools, Britain’s Ricky Stevenson is out after defeats to Russians Mikhail Gutnik and Mikhail Letnikov.

In the BC4 competition reigning World Champion Stephen McGuire continued his title defence in impressive style.

An 11-2 win over Ivan Frolov of Russia sealed his third win in Pool A, confirming top spot after he had already qualified for the round of 16 yesterday.

Britain’s Evie Edwards and Louis Saunders were eliminated before the knockouts, however, as both suffered losses to end their campaigns in the individual event.

Saunders - the youngest member of the GB squad at just 16 – missed out in a tough group containing four-time Paralympic Champion Dirceu Pinto after he was beaten by Colombia Duban Cely, whilst Edwards lost to Portuguese Nuno Guerreiro.

Jamie McCowan qualified for the BC3 Last 16 with a perfect record after a 4-3 win over Canadian Eric Bussiere, and Patrick Wilson squeezed through his pool on points difference despite a 7-3 loss to Howon Jeong.

Finally, Claire Taggart was edged out of her second group match against Luis Cristaldo of Argentina, going down 5-3 before her third group match on Tuesday morning.

Competition continues tomorrow with the knockouts, and Smith, McGuire and McCowan are all in action in their bids for individual titles.