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Papering without a significant effect.

What has snowed slowly disappears and what has frozen slowly melts. I am talking about the outside temperature and the snow that covered the Kisakallio sports center yesterday afternoon. However, inside the hall, the weather fluctuations are not very noticeable. We were curious to see what the nighttime preparation of the stones had brought, so we went to watch the men's matches in the morning. The effect, which usually manifests itself in the form of more open trajectories and more so-called "finish", was not as big as we expected. There was more of a slowdown from 15.5 to 14.5 and a more visible final rotation of the moving stone, but practically nothing happened with the fast stones. We watched part of our men's match against the Scots (Mouat). From a 1:5 down after four ends, the Czechs reached a fairly even last part of the game, but the final score recorded in the scoresheet is 5:10. The Poles surprised the Norwegians, recording their second win in a row.

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The women faced the Germans (Messenzehl) at two o´clock local time. The match brought great twists and turns, chances on both sides and wild developments in some ends. The Czechs lost 8:11 and closed the first period of the Round Robin with a score of zero to three. In the next matches, it will be necessary to improve the quality of the game and make better use of the opportunities offered.

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The evening men's round went on late into the night. The Czechs went into extra ends with Italy. A three-point lead before the tenth end looked very promising for Lukáš Klíma's team, but Joel Retornaz fought back and sent the match into the eleventh end with a three-pointer. During the time-out, Italian super-coach Ryan Fry advised his players to play Amos Mosaner's second stone as a guard, even though the Czech stone was the best at that moment. The Italians were not too keen on this, but they obeyed the instruction. The situation in front of the circles subsequently became so tangled that Joel had to play a long raise with his last stone, which did not work. Our boys thus have a valuable scalp and their second victory.

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Some of us are watching this year's European Championship through the lens of expectations of systemic changes announced by the World Curling Federation (WCF). These changes relate, among other things, to strengthening the perception of regional championships as mere tournaments from which countries qualify for the World Championship. This year's "Europe" is a clear illustration of the WCF's efforts to make the world championship the only truly elite competition for national teams and to push aside the previously largest European tournament for national teams - the European Championship. This is probably a shame. The result of these efforts may be a decrease in media interest in the European Championships, and thus a more difficult search for quality and qualified organisers of these events. The ongoing European Championships 2025 in Lohje, Finland, clearly signals a gradual loss of the characteristics typical of top sports competitions.