MOUAT’S MEN AIM TO TAKE EUROS FORM INTO WORLD CHAMPS?

British Curling 31ST MARCH 2023 SHARE?

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Having won a third European Curling Championships title in their third appearance at the event earlier this season, Bruce Mouat’s Scotland team is looking to emulate the way they have ended Niklas Edin’s domination of that tournament as they target toppling the Swede at the BKT Tires & OK Tire World Men’s Curling Championship (April 1-9). Mouat, Grant Hardie, Bobby Lammie and Hammy McMillan have made the trip to Ottawa chasing a full set of medals, after winning bronze on their debut in 2018, then silver on the most recent of their three appearances, two years ago. Since then they became the first Scottish men’s team to achieve top spot in the world rankings last year on the back of an unprecedented run which saw them become the first non-Canadian team to win three Grand Slam of Curling events and they also reached the final at last year’s Winter Olympics. However, in Mouat’s absence from the event last year, Sweden’s Team Edin extended their record haul of world titles to six, their fourth successive victory at the event and while the Scots have enjoyed the upper hand at the Euros, their rivals got the better of them in both the 2021 World Championships and 2022 Olympic finals.?

“We’ve had a bit of success at the Worlds with two medals, but we’re just waiting for that gold medal and hopefully this can be the year we win it,” said Mouat. “It’s been dominated by Sweden in the last few years, or even more than that, so we’re just going to have to try to bring our winning mentality that we had for the Europeans into the Worlds and see what we can do against the big teams when we get to the final stages hopefully.” Mouat expects this to be a very different experience to their visit to Canada for the 2021 event which was played in a bubble under COVID restrictions. “We’re very excited to get back to a World Championship and what makes it even more exciting is that our family and friends can come this time, unlike 2021,” he said. “We’re really happy to have that support again and a World Championships in Canada is just a bit different, a bit more special. “They just feel really exciting to play in because the fans are all here, all understand the sport and all cheer for good curling.” They begin their campaign against another of the leading European teams, their rivalry with Italy’s Team Retornaz having intensified over the past season. While the Scots prevailed in the European Championships, winning both their round-robin and semi-final encounters, the Italians beat them in a Grand Slam final in Canada, only for Mouat to avenge that soon after in successfully defending the Perth Masters title at the turn of the year. “Everything’s been great our here so far and we’re really looking forward to getting on the ice against Italy, which will be a very tough game,” said the Scottish skip. “We’ve played them quite a few times this year and probably had about a 50/50 success rate. “They’re an amazing team and have come on so far in the last two years. “They got a World Championships medal last year, so we’ll be looking to give them a good game, hopefully set a tone for the week and see what we can build on the back of that.” As they look to do so they will be supported by a group of former domestic rivals with Michael Goodfellow, who joined them this season as their team coach and Ross Paterson working with him for this event, while Team Mouat’s fifth player is Kyle Waddell. They comprised three of the four-man team that beat Team Mouat in the first ever and to date only all-Scottish final at a Grand Slam final when they met at The Boost National in 2018 and there is strong mutual respect that has been built through working together on the British Curling programme at the National Curling Academy over the years. “It’s been great having Michael on board this year. He’s brought a lot to the team, including the great experience he had as an athlete,” said Mouat. “We’re fortunate to have him as a full-time coach. He’s worked really well with us this year which has been proved with the successes that we’ve had. “We’ve got another addition with the addition of Ross Paterson coming over to help us in a coaching capacity, while we enjoyed working with Kyle at the Euros earlier this season, so it feels like a very strong team that we’ve got here.”