[ritchiebaby]

These Championships take place this coming week in the wonderfully named city of Moose Jaw, in the equally wonderfully named province of Saskatchewan in Canada.


The winners take home this magnificent trophy (or maybe not as the case may be)

The competition consists of 13 teams, namely Austria, Canada, China, Czechia, Germany, Italy, Japan, Korea, Norway, Scotland, Sweden, Switzerland and United States. All of these will play 12 games between Saturday 29 March and Friday 4 April. The lucky few will play off for the Qualification Places on Saturday 5 April and the Medals on Sunday 6 April.

Scotland are once again represented by Bruce Mouat, Grant Hardie, Bobby Lammie and Hammy McMillan with Kyle Waddell in reserve in case of accidents. They are currently leading the World rankings, but that will just give their opponents extra incentive to beat them.


See how easy it is when the national governing body (RCCC) puts the schedule up on their website. Some of these games will be on the BBC website and i-Player, but there are no details yet.

WARNING - The first game is actually at 1am GMT, but Summer Time literally doesn't start until 2am when the clocks go forward to 3am, so the game will carry on as normal, but not finish until after 4.30am. I think Not that any of us will be watching at that ungodly hour anyway.

[ritchiebaby]

The usual suspects from Scotland got off to a great start against Austria, winning 12 -2 after only 6 ends. A score of 5 shots in the first end, then another 5 shots in the fourth end made life very comfortable for the Scots. In their second game, they beat Japan 9-6 ater 9 ends. Again a big score (of 4 shots) in the second end had them looking good but they promptly lost 4 shots in the next end and were only 6-5 ahead after 5 ends, but 3 consecutive scores of one shot each put them far enough ahead for the win.

By the time Scotland play their third game tonight in Canada against Korea, it'll be 2am here in the good old summer time. They then play the hosts at 9pm in game that could prove vital at the end of the week.

The game against Canada will be shown live on the BBC Sport website and the i-Player.

[ritchiebaby]

Scotland beat Korea by 9-3 in the early game, and were never behind, scoring 3 shots in the 9th end to force the concession.

In their second game it was tight all the way with the Scots again never being behind. The score was 3-3 after 3 ends and that remained the same for the next 4 ends. With a fantastic promoted triple take-out from Brad Jacobs, Canada tied the game at 5-5 at the 10th end. It took a last stone take-out from Bruce Mouat winning the game in the extra end.

Tomorrow's games see Scotland play Czechia at 2am and then Italy at 9pm.

[ritchiebaby]

After hitting the heights against Canada, Scotland came back down to earth with a bump against Czechia, losing 2-8 after only 7 ends. The Scots lost 3 successive ends at a cost of 5 shots early on and then lost 3 shots in the 7th end, so conceded the game. Bruce Mouat had a percentage score of 71, really poor by his standards. All the Scottish players were outgunned by their immediate opponents, so it's not just down to him.

They played against Italy in their second game and were losing 5-6 after 8 ends. A brilliant take-out from a re-energised Bruce Mouat got Scotland 4 shots to grab a sufficient lead to run the Italians out of stones in the last end to win 9-7.

The Scots now lead the table after 6 games with 5 wins alongside China. Canada, Switzerland and Norway have 4 wins and there are 11 teams still in the hunt.

Scotland play Switzerland (yes, definitely this time) at 4pm tomorrow, then Norway at 9pm.

[ritchiebaby]

Once again Scotland were outplayed by their immediate opponents in their 7-11 loss against Switzerland. The loss of 3 shots in the 2nd end and 4 shots in the 5th end proved much too difficult to overturn in a game at this level.

In the second game it was the same statistics again with no Scottish player getting the better of their opponent. The difference in this game is that they played the big shots well, eventually beating Norway 8-4, but it did take a last stone take-out to score 3 shots and make the score look comfortable.

Scotland are tied with Canada and China at the top of the table with 6 wins each, followed by Czechia, Sweden and Switzerland on 5 wins. Germany and Norway are on 4 wins and still have a great chance to qualify. With 4 games to go, Italy, Japan and United States on 3 wins have an outside chance, but no more than that.

Tomorrow's games are against Sweden at 4pm (on the Beeb Sports website and i-Player) and United States at 9pm.