Scotland’s hopes of reaching the knockout phase of the World Women’s Curling Championships took a blow after a losing both their games on Tuesday.
After a 10-6 defeat to Korea in the afternoon session in Beijing, Eve Muirhead’s rink had the toughest fixture of all when they faced unbeaten Canada in the evening session.
And an 8-2 defeat left her team in joint seventh place, with three wins from seven matches and only four matches left to play.
After two scoreless ends Rachel Homan’s Canadian rink took the upper hand with two in the third, and another two in the fifth.
Muirhead’s quartet pulled two back the following end, but when the Canadian’s scored four in the seventh, the contest was over.
“We were out-played again,” said Sochi 2014 bronze medallist Muirhead. “I missed a few and you can’t afford to do that against a team like Canada.
“It’s win, win, win now. We’ve got to re-set and try to take every game at a time.”
Muirhead’s rink carried a 3-2 record into Tuesday, sitting in joint fourth, and remained in fourth after the morning’s session, in which the Scots did not feature.
The Koreans then raced into a 4-1 lead after three ends of the afternoon session, taking two in each of the first and third ends, giving them a lead that Eunjung Kim never looked likely to give up.
The rinks exchanged two stones apiece in the next two ends, but it was the consistency of the Koreans – scoring two in five of the ten ends – that led them to victory.
Leaving Muirhead to bemoan her record against the Koreans.
“I don’t think I’ve ever beaten her,” she added.
“That was a bit of a carry-over from last night [a 7-3 loss to Sweden]. We just didn’t sharpen up on the bits that we wanted to.
“For me personally, I didn’t have my best game out there and when the skip isn’t playing well you’re not going to win games are you?”
Elsewhere in the day’s final session, Germany defeated Italy 7-5 while the USA overcame China by the same scoreline.
And there was another big win for Sweden, who downed Switzerland 9-4 with three ends remaining to keep the Swedes second with just one loss from their seven matches.
The Czech Republic and Russia still share third place with four wins each, while Switzerland and the USA now join them in a four-way tie for third.
Germany, Korea and Scotland are all then tied on three wins in seventh, with China and Italy both having recorded two wins, and Denmark rock bottom of the table having lost all of their seven matches.
Muirhead’s rink face China in Wednesday’s morning session, before playing Switzerland in the afternoon.
Sportsbeat 2017