[Lord Snooty]

Echoes of Team Muirhead at the Olympics.

[ritchiebaby]

This evening's Semi-final resulted in a heavy 3-11 defeat against Scotland Women by Denmark. The Scots lost 8 shots in 3 ends early on and that proved to be the difference. Switzerland defeated Italy by 9-5 in the earlier Women's Semi-final, meaning that Italy and Scotland contest the Bronze Medal game at 1pm tomorrow. The Gold Medal game between Denmark and Switzerland will take place at 7am on Saturday.

Scotland Men beat Italy by 7-5 to finish the group on 8 wins, the same as Italy and Switzerland. The Swiss were placed 1st in the Draw Shot Challenge, in front of Scotland by 2.48cms, who in turn demoted Italy by only 0.19cms - the thickness of a 5p coin. Tonight's Semi-final at 7pm is Italy v Scotland, with the other Semi-final between Switzerland and Sweden at 7am tomorrow.

After being 2-3 down against Slovenia after 5 ends, England Women upped their scoring rate in the following 5 ends. Unfortunately so did Slovenia, leaving England with an 8-9 defeat, losing 3 shots in the final end. However yesterday's win against Austria, allied to Slovakia being thumped by Czech Republic, proved vital and they remain in the B-Division.

The Women's Semi-finals are Czech Republic v Slovenia and Lithuania v Estonia, both at 6pm tomorrow.

I'll be curling at my local rink at the same time as all of tonight's games, so it'll be a morning catch-up tomorrow.

[ritchiebaby]

Scotland Men did the needful against Italy last night for the second time in one day, winning by 7-4, largely due to scoring 4 shots in the 8th end. This morning Switzerland beat Sweden 6-3 in the second Semi-final.

The Bronze Medal game between Italy and Sweden takes place tonight at 6pm with the Gold Medal game between Switzerland and Scotland at 12 noon tomorrow.

England Men finished on a high, beating Ukraine by 10-5, scoring 3 shots in both the 1st and 9th ends, but would it be enough?
Ireland Men also finished on a high, beating Slovakia by 13-5, including 5 shots at the 5th end, but would that be enough?
Wales Men unfortunately slipped to a 5-6 defeat against Lithuania, losing 2 shots in the last end. Would that still enable them to make the cut?
Well, one nation had to be disappointed and the answers are NO, YES and YES. England lost out solely because they couldn't beat either Ireland or Wales.

The Men's Qualification Games are in progress just now. Ireland are playing France and Wales are taking on Latvia.

[ritchiebaby]

After being 4-4 at the 5th end in their game against Italy, Scotland Women turned the screw in the next 3 ends to take a 5-shot lead, eventually securing a 9-5 victory to win the Bronze Medals. Well done to the Scots after a very ordinary start to the competition. The comparitively new team did very well and acquitted themselves admirably.

But the dream is over for the Ireland Men and the Wales Men after both were defeated in this afternoon's Qualification Games. Ireland were beaten 5-6 by France in a very tight game. Similarly, Wales were beaten 8-12, despite recovering from 3-9 down after 6 ends to reach 8-9 with 2 ends to go.

France now play Finland and Latvia play Netherlands in tonight's Semi-finals.

[ritchiebaby]

A-Division Results

Scotland completed a successful defence of their European title this afternoon with two precision raised shots from Bruce Mouat, scoring 2 shots in the last end to win 5-4 over Switzerland in a tense final. Congratulations to the whole team securing the 2nd Medal for Scotland this week.

GOLD  - SCOTLAND - Bruce Mouat (skip), Grant Hardie (third), Bobby Lammie (second), Hammy McMillan (lead), Kyle Waddell (alternate), Michael Goodfellow (coach)
SILVER - SWITZERLAND - Benoit Schwarz (fourth), Yannick Schwaller (skip and third), Sven Michel (second), Pablo Lachat (lead), Haavard Vad Petersson (coach)
BRONZE - ITALY - Joel Retornaz (skip), Amos Mosaner (third), Sebastiano Arman (second), Mattia Giovanella (lead), Alberto Pimpini (alternate) and Claudio Pescia (coach).

In the Women's Event, Denmark beat Switzerland 5-4 after an extra end. At the 2nd last end Denmark were lying 4 shots when Alina Paetz drew the shot to go one ahead. Not to be out done, at the last end the Swiss were lying 5 shots, when Madeleine Dupont drew the shot to level the game.

GOLD - DENMARK - skip, Madeleine Dupont; third, Mathilde Halse; second, Denise Dupont; lead, My Larsen; alternate, Jasmin Lander; coach, Ulrik Schmidt.
SILVER - SWITZERLAND - skip, Silvana Tirinzoni; fourth, Alina Paetz; second, Carole Howald; lead, Briar Schwaller-Huerlimann; alternate Anna Gut; coach Pierre Charette.
BRONZE - SCOTLAND - skip, Rebecca Morrison; third, Gina Aitken; second, Sophie Sinclair; lead, Sophie Jackson; alternate, Hailey Duff; coach, Nancy Smith.

B-Division Summary

With promotion to the A-Division already assured for both teams, Netherlands men went 5-0 up after three ends in their final against Finland on Saturday morning. They went on to win the final by 11-6 and take the gold medals. In the bronze medal game, France beat Latvia by 10-3.

The women’s gold final was between Czech Republic and Estonia. Finishing with a score of four in the eighth end, Estonia won by 10-3. Both these teams will play in next season’s A-Division. In the women’s bronze game, Lithuania beat Slovenia by 10-6.

[ritchiebaby]