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No sooner have two Championships finished, another one turns up. Whilst not including the top curling nations, this qualifying tournament for promotion to the B Division includes Ireland and Wales.

The Women’s field consist of Belgium, Croatia, Finland, France, Ireland, Spain, Ukraine and Wales.

The participating teams in the Men’s field are: Andorra, Bulgaria, Croatia, Ireland, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Portugal, Romania and Ukraine.

The event will be played at the Kaunas Ice Palace, Lithuania and runs from today until Thursday. In Thursday's Semi-finals at 9.30am the first-placed teams will play the fourth-placed teams, while the second-placed teams will meet the third-placed teams. The winners will play in the Gold medal games and qualify for the European Curling Championships 2022 B-Division. The losers will play in the Bronze medal games. All medal games will be played on Thursday at 3.30pm.

For the Women there were no games today and Ireland play against Ukraine at 12 noon and France at 8pm. Wales play the reverse fixtures - France at 12 noon and Ukraine at 8pm.

In today's single session, Ireland Men scraped past Lithuania by 5-4 after an extra end. Tomorrow they play Ukraine at 8am and then Liechenstein at 4pm.

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The Women's Competition got underway today and the teams representing the home countries are-

IRELAND - Ailsa Anderson (Skip), Katie Kerr (Vice-Skip), Nina Clancy (2nd) and Stephanie McDonald (Lead). Nina plays out of my local ice rink, so I've included a photograph of her, as I've not yet managed to source team photographs.


WALES - Laura Beever (Skip), Judith Glazier (Vice-Skip), Emily Simpson (2nd) and Anna Carruthers (Lead). It only took seconds to find a photograph of the Welsh Ladies team, so well done to the Welsh Curling Association. Laura Beever wins her 82nd cap, with the others earning their 1st.



Ireland were 3 shots down after 5 ends, but fought back well to take the game against Ukraine into an extra end, which they lost 7-9. Their 2nd game against France saw them down 1-4 after 5 ends, but again they rallied, scoring 6 shots in the last 3 ends to win 7-4.

Wales had an equally close game against France until they scored 5 shots in the 6th end, coming out on top 10-3. Tonight they played their 2nd game and it took an extra end to squeeze past Ukraine by 7-6.

Tomorrow's games are Ireland v Finland at noon and Belgium at 8pm. Wales play Croatia at noon and then Spain at 8pm.


For the Men, only IRELAND from the home nations has an entry. Their team is John Wilson (Skip), Kyle Paradis (Vice-Skip), James Russell (2nd), Craig Whyte (Lead) and Eoin McCrossan (Alternate).

Following on from their win yesterday, Ireland continued their winning ways with victory over Ukraine by 6-4 this morning and by 10-3 over Liechtenstein this evening.

Their games tomorrow are against Andorra at 8am and Romania at 4pm.

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Ireland Women lost to Finland this morning by 4-5, after being 1-5 down with 3 ends to play. 3 single shots in the last 3 ends meant they fell just short of a remarkable comeback. In their 2nd game against Belgium, they once again fell agonisingly short, losing 7-8. After only 1 win so far, Ireland Women will need to win all 3 remaining games to have any realistic chance of being in the top four. Tomorrow's games will be against Croatia at noon and Spain at 8pm, then a local derby against Wales on Wednesday.

Wales Women were slightly worse, losing 4-9 against Croatia with 1 end to play and then losing 3-6 against Spain, again with 1 end to play. However they have 2 wins and can challenge for the top four with another couple of wins, but 3 wins would make it safe. Wales Women play Belgium at noon tomorrow, then Finland at 8pm with the local derby against Ireland on Wednesday to possibly decide both their fates.

Ireland Men got past Andorra, winning 6-3 after 7 ends and then beat Romania 7-6 after being 0-5 down after 2 ends and had to score 4 shots in the last 3 ends to get there. Sitting at the top of the table with 5 wins out of 5, they should be able to qualify. Tomorrow Ireland Men play Portugal at 8am and on Wednesday they finish against Croatia at 7pm.

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Ireland Women got their act together in some style today, scoring in 5 of the 6 ends played, beating Croatia 11-3 and repeated the dose tonight beating Spain 8-4, including 4 shots in the 2nd end. Meanwhile, Wales Women lost 4-6 to Belgium and then lost their next game 6-7 to Finland after losing 3 shots in the last end.

These two tales of contrasting fortunes mean that Ireland move up to 4th equal position with Croatia on 3 wins. The 3 teams above them - Finland, Belgium and Spain - have already qualified for the Semi-finals. Wales are on 2 wins, giving extra spice to the local derby tomorrow at 2pm. Without going into all the possibilities, either team could progress with a win, depending on Croatia's and Ukraine's results.

Ireland Men demolished Portugal by 12-3 after 6 ends. including a score of 6 shots in the 2nd end. They are definite qualifiers with 2 games to go on 6 wins out of 6. These 2 games are against Bulgaria at 9am and Croatia at 7pm.

Finally here are a selection of photographs from the Irish Curling Association FB page on a good day for Ireland.

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Ireland Men scored 10 shots in the firat 3 ends to thump Bulgaria 11-2 after only 6 ends to continue their unbeaten record, However they were brought back down to earth with another thump, losing 3 shots in the 7th end and the game 5-7. However they still finished top of the table to progress to the Semi-finals tomorrow where they will play Portugal. Ukraine will play Lithuania in the other Semi-final.

Ireland Women were equally dominant in their final game against Wales today, winning 8-2 after 7 ends and being in front all the way. This result was enough to lift them into 3rd place and a Semi-final spot against Belgium, with Finland v Spain the other Semi-final. Wales finished in 6th place.

All the Semi-finals take place tomorrow at 9.30am with the Finals at 3.30pm. The Finalists will be promoted to the B Division in November's European Championships. Both Irish teams are certainly good enough to win Gold and my Irish ancestry will stand me in good stead once again.Come on Ireland!!!



PS - It's hardly worthwhile posting a new thread at this late stage, but the WCF have sneaked (well, unnoticed by me) a new competition into the schedules this week. The World Wheelchair Mixed Doubles has been playing all week in Lohja, Finland, Scotland did have an entry, but only won 3 of their 8 games, failing to qualify.

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Ireland Women fell at the Semi-final stages, losing 8-11 to Belgium, despite being 5-1 ahead after 3 ends. They then lost 9 shots in 3 ends to leave themselves far too much to do. Ireland then lost the Bronze Medal game against Finland by 7-9, after being 7-6 up going into the last end. All credit to them for qualifying for the top 4, the Medals being just a step too far.

GOLD - Belgium
SILVER - Spain
BRONZE - Finland

On the other hand, Ireland Men marched to the Gold Medal in impressive fashion, winning both of their games by 8-2. In otherwise tight games, the Irish scored 4 shots in the 3rd end against Portugal in the Semi-final and an even more spectacular 5 shots in the 7th end against Ukraine in the Final. Ireland Men are now promoted to the B Division for this year's event in November.

GOLD -  Ireland
SILVER - Ukraine
BRONZE - Portugal

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