Prized bowls belonging to one of Scotland's main medal contenders at the Commonwealth Games have been recovered by police after they were stolen from his local club.
Four-times world indoor bowls champion Paul Foster had been playing and practising with the specially-made set since the spring, and was left "devastated" when they were taken just two weeks before the Glasgow 2014 bowls competition begins.
Three of the four bowls were stolen from the locker room at his local club, Troon Portland, on Monday.
"This is a huge relief for me," said the Troon 41-year-old, a Gold medallist in the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games.
"I've have seen the bowls, they is no doubt they are mine and at first glance they appear to be undamaged.
"I would like to thank the police, the media, the public and everyone who has helped the police in the campaign to find them in such a short space of time."
Foster pleaded with the culprit to return them as he had amassed countless hours of play and practice time with the bowls and planned to use them in competition at the Games.
He said yesterday: ''I'm now trying to get another set of the same make and model but even if I do, I know that you won't ever get two sets of bowls that are 100% the same.
''This is obviously devastating to me and I spent the whole of last night thinking about who it could be, but I've got no idea."
Police Scotland confirmed today that they have recovered the limited edition Henselite Tiger bowls, which are blue with white speckling and each have a picture of the Kelvin Hall in the centre.
No details of where the bowls were found has been released, but Foster said he has seen them and they appear to be undamaged.
Foster, 41, a gold medallist at the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games, said: "This is a huge relief for me. I've seen the bowls, there is no doubt they are mine and at first glance they appear to be undamaged.
"I would like to thank the police, the media, the public and everyone who has helped the police in the campaign to find them in such a short space of time."
The bowls are to be checked by forensic officers before they are returned to Foster.
Police are continuing to appeal for anyone with information on the theft to contact them.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article