[ritchiebaby]

These Championships will take place at the TD Place Arena in Ottawa, Canada from Saturday 1 to Sunday 9 April. Ottawa was originally scheduled to host the championship in 2021, but due to the pandemic, the event was moved inside the Calgary bubble. Ottawa's famous celebrities include actors Lorne Green and Dan Aykroyd plus singers Paul Anka and Alanis Morrisette.

The competition follows the format used by the Womens' Championship last week. Qualification games will take place on Saturday 8 April at 7pm (UK time) followed by the Semi-finals at 12 midnight. The Bronze medal game and then the Gold medal final will be staged on Sunday 9 April, at 4pm and at 9pm, respectively.

Scotland, Switzerland, Italy, Sweden, Norway, Türkiye, Czech Republic and Germany, in qualification order, secured their World Championship spots with Canada, Korea, United States, Japan and New Zealand qualifying from the Pan Continental Championships. From the plethora of strong teams, I would expect that Canada, Italy, Scotland, Sweden, Switzerland and United States will be in the top 6 teams to progress to the later stages. A word of warning though, just about every other team has the chance to upset the odds and knock out a more fancied team.

The Scots team are the usual suspects - Bruce Mouat (Skip), Grant Hardie (Vice-Skip), Bobby Lammie (2nd), Hammy McMillan (Lead) and Kyle Waddell (Alternate). They won Silver at these Championships in 2021 and at the 2022 Winter Olympics. The strong favourites must be the Sweden team, skipped by Niklas Edin, who are the current World and Olympic Champions.

[ritchiebaby]

Tonight's game at 7pm sees Scotland take on Italy at 7pm, with their 2 games on Sunday are against Turkiye at 2pm and Sweden at 7pm.

SCOTLAND


Bruce Mouat                                                            Grant Hardie


Bobby Lammie                                                         Hammy McMillan                                                      Kyle Waddell

[ritchiebaby]

A good solid start from Scotland this weelend. They beat Italy by 7-4 yesterday and followed that up with an 8-1 demolition of Turkiye but slipped up against Sweden, losing 4-7 after a loose 9th end. Sweden have won the previous 4 World Championships, so there's no disgrace in that defeat.

Tomorrow night at 7pm sees the Scots take on Germany to get their week back on track.

[ritchiebaby]

Scotland did get back on track tonight, beating Germany 8-6. The Scots got off to a flier scoring 5 shots without reply in the first 4 ends and kept the Germans at bay for the rest of the game.

Tomorrow they have a tough day, firstly against United States at 2pm, then Switzerland at midnight. United States have started the week poorly but they will be confident (that's loud and arrogant to us Brits) and dangerous.

[ritchiebaby]

Scotland had an important victory today, beating United States by 10-8. Down 6-8 after 8 ends, the Scots scored 2 shots in the 9th end, followed by 2 shots against the hammer in the 10th to put the Americans in their place.

After tonight's late game against the Swiss, they have to play Japan at 2pm on Wednesday, then Korea at midnight.

[ritchiebaby]

Another poor 9th end from Scotland saw them slip to a 4-7 defeat by Switzerland. However a defeat that could be accepted if they did the business against Japan, which they did by winning 9-2 after only 6 ends and scoring 5 shots in the 6th end.

Scotland sit in 4th place on 5 wins alongside Canada, but behind Norway and Switzerland on 7 wins and Sweden on 6 wins.

Tomorrow's games are versus Norway at 7pm and Canada at midnight. Concentration will be vital in both of these games, where 1 win and 1 loss should keep them in the hunt.

[ritchiebaby]

Scotland took full advantage of their boost in form with another 5, this time in the 3rd end, to beat Korea 9-3 after 7 ends. Then they continued their winning ways, beating leaders Norway by 9-5 after 9 ends, killing the game with 3 shots in that end.

After another vital game against Canada at midnight, Scotland play Czech Republic at 7pm and New Zealand at midnight tomorrow. On paper they should be an easier couple of games, but curling isn't played on paper and it can turn out to be a slippery game. Tomorrow's games will finish off the round-robin stage and the target is the top 6.

Switzerland have already qualified on 9 wins, with Norway and Sweden on 8 wins each. Canada and  Scotland are tied in 4th place on 7 wins. Only Italy on 6 wins and Japan on 5 wins can push one of them out of the reckoning.

More concentration and take your chances, lads, and you can progress.

[ritchiebaby]

The excellent form showed by Scotland on Thundering Thursday continued with a win over Canada by 6-3, although the Canadian team put up a good fight. Also thanks to defeats for both Italy and Japan it means that both the Canadian and Scottish teams are guaranteed progression to the next stage, where they join Norway and Sweden.

Only Italy and Japan can grab the 6th Qualification spot and, of course, they play each other at 2pm this afternoon. In fact right now, and Italy have taken a 4-2 lead after 3 ends.

[ritchiebaby]

Scotland comfortably defeated Czech Republic 9-3 tonight to keep up the winning habit. This win puts them in 2nd position alongside Norway and Sweden on 9 wins, behind Switzerland on 10 wins. Canada and Italy are on 8 wins.

Italy beat Japan 12 -5 earlier today to take the 6th Qualification spot. All the Qualifiers are now playing for final positions for the Draw for the Qualifying games and Semi-finals.

[ritchiebaby]

A lot has happened since I posted last night with the round-robin games being completed, Scotland winning 10-4 against New Zealand. This and other results mean that the Scots finish 2nd and go directly to the Semi-finals, where they are joined by Switzerland who had topped the standings.

The upshot is that Italy beat Norway 8-4 and Canada amazingly beat Sweden 9-1 this afternoon in the Qualifying Games. The Semi-finals at midnight are therefore Canada v Switzerland and Italy v Scotland. Tomorrow's Medal Games are the Bronze Game for the losers at 4pm and the Gold/Silver Game for the winners at 9pm.