Day 4 at Taarnby

Keith Prentice and his team lost to Italy this morning, but defeated the Netherlands this afternoon. The team's remaining game is against Hungary tomorrow evening.

Barbara Watt's side won against the USA. Ireland and Canada are the games to be played tomorrow.

Linescores and standings are all here. The results are mirrored on the WCF website here, and there are lots of photos here.

John Brown's reports from the rink are in Toothy Tales, here. And Louise Kerr is blogging on the Irish Curling Association website here.

Day 3 at Taarnby

Keith Prentice, Lockhart Steele, Robin Aitken and Tommy Fleming got off their mark at the World Senior Curling Championships in Denmark today. The Scottish men defeated Japan in their third game. They have two games tomorrow, against Italy and the Netherlands.

Barbara Watt's team defeated Finland. The Scots meet the USA tomorrow.

Linescores and standings are all here. Note though that the standings are expressed in an unusual way, see left.

If the table says 4-4, this does NOT mean four wins and four losses, the way that standings are traditionally expressed. It means that Canada and New Zealand have each played four and won four. Scotland looks to have three wins and one loss. Not so. It's one win and two losses.

Stupidity? Ignorance? Does the wheel have to be invented at every competition? Perhaps this is just the traditional way of doing things in Denmark. But it's wrong, and confusing in my view.

The results are mirrored on the WCF website here, with the standings listed in correct format. There are lots of photos in the WCF galleries here.

John Brown's reports from the rink are in Toothy Tales, here.

Day 2 at Taarnby

Barbara Watt, Jean Hammond, Maggie Barry and Valerie Mahon beat Denmark yesterday at the World Senior Curling Championships in Taarnby. The Scots play Finland later today, in the third of their six section games. Their record so far: won one, lost one.

Scotland's men lost to Canada yesterday, their second loss in as many games. Four more still to play. Up next for the Prentice team is Japan.

Scores and standings are all here. There are lots of photos in the WCF galleries here.

And do read John Brown's reports from the rink, in Toothy Tales, here.

Day 1 at Taarnby

Scotland's women were beaten by Russia in their first game at the World Senior Curling Championship in Taarnby yesterday. The Scottish men were beaten too, by New Zealand.

The event website is here. Results are here, but you will also find them on the WCF website here for the men, and here for the women.

Barbara Watt and her team meet Denmark today (Monday). Keith Prentice's side face Canada.

Make sure to keep your eye on John Brown's blog here.

Toothy Tales from Taarnby

John Brown is blogging from the World Senior Championships in Denmark.

Find his first post 'Welcome to Copenhagen', with photos of the rink, here.

World Senior Championships

Scotland will be represented by the Keith Prentice and Barbara Watt teams (see here) at the World Senior Curling Championships 2012 in Taarnby, Denmark. The first games are on Sunday.

There are fourteen women’s teams which will play in two groups. Scotland (Barbara Watt, Jean Hammond, Maggie Barry, Valerie Mahon with alternate Judith Carr) is in Group A with Canada, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Russia and USA. Russia is the first opposition for the Barbara Watt team on Sunday afternoon.

Group B contains the Czech Republic, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Slovakia, Sweden and Switzerland.

Each group will play a round robin. Then the team ranked first in Group A will play the team ranked second in Group B in one semifinal, and the team ranked second in the A group will play the team ranked first in Group B in the other semifinal. No Page Playoffs in this competition. The winning semifinalists will contest the Championship final. The losing semifinalists will play for the bronze medals.

The twenty-three men’s teams play in three groups. Scotland (Keith Prentice, Lockhart Steele, Robin Aitken and Tommy Fleming, with alternate Archie Craig) is in Group A with Canada, Hungary, Italy, Japan, Netherlands and New Zealand. Poland, who were originally listed in group A, have had to withdraw from the championship. So each team in this group will have a bye during the games scheduled against Poland. As Team Prentice was due to play Poland in the first round at 09.00 on Sunday, Scotland has the bye in the first round, and will play New Zealand in the afternoon.

Group B has England, Finland, Ireland, Latvia, Russia, Slovakia, Switzerland and the USA. Group C has Australia, Austria, Czech Republic, Denmark, Germany, Norway, Sweden and Wales.

It's always a bit complicated to get the playoff teams sorted out when there are three sections, but after the round robins have been played (plus any tiebreakers) the top three teams in each section will be ranked. The 1st and 2nd ranked teams from the three sections qualify for quarterfinals, as well as the 3rd ranked team with the best Draw Shot Challenge result. The other two 3rd ranked teams play a qualification game to decide the last team to go into the quarters. Thereafter it will be straight semis and final.

The event website is here where you will find the team list, draw, and results.

Senior Sightings

The World Senior Curling Championships are just over a week away, April 14-21, at the Taarnby Curling Club in Copenhagen. Yesterday, Scotland's women were on the ice at the Lanarkshire Ice Rink in a practice session against the English men. I have filed this photo, courtesy of Phil Barton, in the category of 'things you don't see every day'! Great to see the English men adopting a colourful approach to the sport with their Loudmouth trousers!

L-R: Tommy Campbell, Barbara Watt, Phil Barton, Maggie Barry, John Summers, Val Mahon, Michael Sutherland, Jean Hammond.

Whereas it will be an international debut for the Scottish women, Michael and his team are hoping at least to match last year's performance in St Paul, when they finished in eighth place, just one place behind Ken Horton's Scots.

Good to learn that Albert Bartlett, the UK’s leading grower and packer of potatoes, is continuing sponsorship of the Irish Senior curling teams. That's Christina Graham, Louise Kerr, Gillian Drury and Marie O’Kane above.

The Irish men’s team: John Jo Kenny, Bill Gray, David Whyte, Tony Tierney and David Hume.