Long and hard day.
It was a very hard and long day. It started very early with a 5.40am wake-up call, a quick warm-up and a liquid breakfast. With the organisers struggling a bit with setting up transport logistics, we were forced to combine the championship shuttle and a local taxi. We were in the hall with a reasonable amount of time to spare. The Scots (Morrison, Dodds, Sinclair and Jackson) are the home team and accordingly took the opening points confidently. The game was level and we were two down but with the advantage of the last stone. In the seventh end, we found ourselves in a tricky situation where the only solution was to move a loose stone placed just outside the rings into the best position. However, the directionally and velocity well cast stone remained in a straight line and surprisingly still moved a stone of the opposite color. The cashed five decided the match before all ends were played. After the women's loss came the men's win over the Turks, followed by the afternoon match against the Swiss (Tirinzoni, Patz, Howald, Witschonke). They are in great form and are undefeated in the tournament so far. And this characteristic remains after the duel with the Czechs. A vigorous start provided the Swiss with a comfortable lead, and although they then had to defend against our improved play, they made no major mistakes and deservedly won. In the evening the men succumbed to the solidly playing Italians. The women have a double match again tomorrow, the men only one.
rnphoto: there's not enough room in the hall to take pictures, so the panoramic photo looks like it does