[ritchiebaby]

In a mad dash to keep pace with my curling commitments, I've joined in on the first day in Lohja, Finland for these Championships.

There are only 11 countries entered from Brazil, Denmark, England, Estonia, Finland, Italy, Japan, Poland, Slovakia, Spain, and Switzerland. The three podium-finisher teams in Lohja qualify for the world championship, taking place in March 2024 in Gangneung, Korea.

Round-robin play starts on Sunday 5 November and continues until Thursday 9 November. The teams have been placed into one group and will play a round robin. At the end of the round robin, a ranking will be established and the first four teams will move onto the semi-finals. The semi-finals will take place at 9.30 on Friday 10 November, where the team ranked first will play the team ranked fourth, and the team ranked second will meet the team ranked third. The winners of the semi-finals advance to the gold medal game; the losers of the semi-finals will play for bronze medals. Both medal games will be held at 16.00 on Friday 10 November.

Representing England are Stewart Pemblett (Skip), Jason Kean (3rd), Karen Aspey (2nd), Julian Mattison (Lead, who will be Vice-skip) and George Potts (Alternate). They are coached by Tony and Rosemary Lenton, Rosemary being a Scottish medal-winning para bowler and English wheelchair curler.

In their first game England absolutely demolished Japan by 16-0, including 6 shots in the 4th end. It's very unusual for a team to be "grannied" (no score) in any game, never mind a World Championship game. In a turnaround in their second game, the English team were defeated 4-9 by Slovakia, mainly due to a loss of 4 shots in the 3rd end.

At 07.30 tomorrow England will play Denmark, then Spain at 16.30.

[ritchiebaby]

England were at it again this morning with another "granny", beating Denmark 12-0 after 6 ends. They obviously like the early mornings, devouring the opposition for breakfast.

They slackened off once again in the afternoon, but still comfortably beat Spain 8-3 after 7 ends.

After the first 4 games, Italy have 4 wins with England, Poland and Slovakia on 3 wins. Let's keep it going.

Tomorrow they take on Brazil at 07.30 and Finland at 12.00.

[ritchiebaby]

England continued their early morning good form with a comfortable 10-4 win over Brazil, scoring 5 shots in the 1st end. However things took a turn for the worse at noon, losing 6-8 against Finland after an extra end. England were never in front and fought back after a shaky start to force the extra end.

Tomorrow they play Switzerland at noon and Estonia at 16.30 to get back on track. Italy still lead with 5 wins and are joined by Slovakia. England, Estonia and Poland have 4 wins, with Finland and Switzerland snapping at their heels on 3 wins.

[ritchiebaby]

After yesterday's defeat, England suffered another couple of reverses today and now have an uphill battle to qualify for the Semi-finals. Firstly they were beaten 4-9 by Switzerland after 7 ends. Being 0-7 down after 3 ends proved far too much for the English team. Then in the last session, they lost 4-7 to Estonia, again after 7 ends. The game was much closer all the way through, but the loss of 2 consecutive ends proved to be their downfall.

With 8 games played, Slovakia have guaranteed qualification with 7 wins, followed by Estonia and Italy on 6 wins. Finland, Poland and Switzerland have 5 wins and England have 4 wins.

Their final 2 games are tough ones against Italy at 12 noon tomorrow and then Poland at 16.30 in the final session, surely needing to win both games to progress. They will still need other results to go their way to achieve qualification.

[ritchiebaby]

I'm sorry to report another 2 losses for England today. Firstly from Italy by 8-11, especially as they were leading 8-7 after the 7th end. Secondly 2-9 after 6 ends to Poland, who dominated the scoring.

Rather disappointingly after a good start to the week, England finished in 7th position on 4 wins and 6 losses. To be fair to them, they were probably in a false position on Tuesday morning with 4 wins out of 5 games, as they had played the "lesser" teams in their good start.

The Semi-final Draw is Estonia v Poland and Italy v Slovakia, both at 07.30 and the Medal Games are due to be played at 14.00.

[ritchiebaby]

Results of today's games

Semi-finals - Estonia 9 Poland 2; Italy 2 Slovakia 7:

Gold Medal Game - Slovakia 8 Estonia 4
Bronze Medal Game - Italy 9 Poland 7

GOLD - Slovakia
SILVER - Estonia
BRONZE - Italy


Skip Peter Zatko, third Radoslav Duris, second Dusan Pitonak, lead Monika Kunkelova, alternate Adrian Durcek and coach Daniela Matulova (in any order you wish)