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For immediate release: 7 February 2015
LOHJA,
Finland – Scotland recorded the biggest win of the opening session of
play at the World Wheelchair Curling Championship 2015 taking place at
the Kisakallio Sports Institute in Lohja, Finland.
They
defeated Germany 12-2 which started off with a score of four points for
the Scots.
By
the fourth end break, Scotland were ahead 10-0 thanks to a combination
of good play and German mistakes. Scotland eventually ran Germany out
of stones after seven ends of play to take their first victory of the
Championship.
Afterwards,
Scotland skip Aileen Neilson said: “We’re certainly happy to come out
and perform the way we know we can. We’ve been practicing hard and it’s
good to get a win on the board in our first game.”
On
starting the game so well, she added: “I think if we start well it
really builds confidence. If it starts from the first stone then that
can develop through. So getting those first few stones in the right
place is really crucial and the guys followed it up and when we had to
clear stones we were making peels and that’s important when you get a
big lead like that. It’s easy for some teams if they get a lot of
stones in play to crawl back so it’s really important that we kept it
really clean and clear.”
Reigning
world and Paralympic gold medallists, Canada, didn’t get off to the
best of starts in their title defence as they lost 8-3 to China.
As
China edged ahead 3-1 after three ends, the turning point came in the
fourth end when they stole two points to lead 5-1 by the break.
Canada
replied with a score of two points in the fifth end but a single point
score in the sixth end and another steal of two points in the seventh
end left the score 8-3 to China before Canada conceded in the following
end.
Canada
are skipped by Mark Ideson this year and after their opening game he
reflected: “You know what, I thought we gave it a good effort. There
was a few times we were on the wrong side of the dime, but otherwise I
thought we threw pretty well. We’re a new team and that was our first
game together on the world stage with me calling the game. We’re
working out some kinks but I think overall we’re fairly happy with the
way we threw it.”
Looking
ahead he continued: “I think we just need to do more of the same. Just
stick to our game plan and as the week goes on we’ll get better and
better and we’ll get used to the ice and get used to each other. We
know we weren’t going to come here and win every game, it’s just one
rock at a time for us.”
Russia
were runners up in last year’s Paralympics and they picked up an
opening day win against the USA.
They
were ahead 3-0 after two ends after taking two points in the first end
followed by a single point steal in the second end.
The
USA fought their way back into the game however, with the score 6-5 to
Russia going into the last end. However a score of four points secured
Russia’s win with the final score 10-5.
After
this game, USA second Jimmy Joseph said: “We had a couple of missed
shots that helped them out unfortunately and then the last end right
there we just aimed to draw on top of the shot rock and came up a
little short and that’s the outcome (the score of four points).”
He
added: “We’re staying positive. I mean it’s the first game - of course
you want to come away with a win but it is what it is. We’ve just got
to pick it up from this game and continue on doing what we know how to
do for the next week. It’s early, everybody wants to win the first game
but somebody’s got to lose. We played very well, we came back. We had a
few mistakes in the beginning but we picked up our game until the very
last end. We could have gave up but we didn’t. We always come back and
play and stay strong.”
Hosts
Finland, playing in only their second World Wheelchair Curling Championship,
edged Slovakia 11-8, but needed an extra end to do so after Slovakia
levelled the game with a score of four points in the eighth end.
Scandinavian
neighbours Sweden and Norway also played out a tight game, which proved
to be a game of two halves.
Sweden
were ahead 7-1 by the fourth end break before Norway scored five points
in the second half of the game. Sweden’s early game form saw them hold
on for their victory as they won by 7-6.
Results,
news and photos from throughout the World Wheelchair Curling
Championship 2015 can be seen on the World Curling Federation’s
official event website: http://www.wwhcc2015.curlingevents.com
RESULTS
Session
1: Sweden 7, Norway 6;
Finland 11, Slovakia 8; China 8, Canada 3; USA 5, Russia 10; Scotland
12, Germany 2.
Standings
after 1 session of play
(W-L):
1.China
1-0
1.
Finland 1-0
1.
Russia 1-0
1.
Scotland 1-0
1.
Sweden 1-0
6.
Canada 0-1
6.
Germany 0-1
6.
Norway 0-1
6.
Slovakia 0-1
6.
USA 0-1
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