Sunday session in Wetzikon.
photo: WCT Wetzikon 2018 champions
rn8.30 - Quarterfinals and big upsets. I was still waiting in the hall on Saturday for the moment when it would be decided who was playing who and on which track, and I brought the information to the team meeting we had that evening. In the morning, however, everything was different because there was a complaint that the draw was not done correctly. Okay, we didn't argue and went up against the German veteran Andrea Schoepp. Although her technique could be described as outdated and somewhat out of date, it is on the other hand true that most of her stones ended up in the right places. This match found us healthily excited. We scored three in the fourth and three in the seventh, and that was enough for a clear win after seven ends. Kolchevska and Kubešková were the best on the course. Winning the quarterfinals secured us two more matches. The semi-final was played shortly after the morning one and was again accompanied by difficulties. The original opponent, Germany's Jentsch, turned out to be Russia's Kovaleva, only to end up in an arc with Switzerland's Schori. The organizers apologized for the confusion, but we didn't care and concentrated on the match. We got off to a great start. With a fairly defensive approach, we were 2-0 up after four ends and well on our way, then Irene Schori's experience showed, with three straight 1s to take a narrow lead. We staved off a loss with a tough draw on the tee line in the eighth end, only to let Schori play a draw in the extra end (after two sumptuous chip shots by Maillard) to win by some eight feet. However, she misjudged the speed of the trac used after the previous hit and it was long. We have a final! There we met the Russian team again after a year, this time led by the sipper Kovaleva. After four ends, we have a four point lead (5-1), but the Russians keep fighting. In the seventh and eighth we get a deuce each time and the match goes into extra time. In it we unerringly clear everything in our way and Anna's last stone knocks out the opponent's stone from the middle of the rings, hidden half behind the guard, and we score two others that are in the rings. After the fight, we win the WCT title in Wetzikon for the second time in a row and are very happy. However, we have a long drive ahead of us, so we get right in the car and head for Prague. We take the good feeling from the valuable win with us. Anna, Bětka, Terka, Ezhen and Eliška played an excellent tournament.