Eve Muirhead and Scotland up and running at European Championships after Russia victory
BySportsbeat
Updated 19/11/2017 at 16:48 GMT
Eve Muirhead and her Scotland rink demonstrated their typical grit and determination to bounce back and secure their first win at the 2017 European Curling Championships.
Scotland's skip Eve Muirhead delivers a stone
Image credit: Reuters
After opening with a 5-2 defeat to Sweden, Muirhead would have been looking to reverse their fortunes when Scotland took on Russia on Sunday morning in St Gallen.
But it went right down to the wire as Russia scored one point in the tenth end to send a tight encounter into an extra end.
Russia skip Anna Sidorova then missed her attempt to remove the Scottish counting stone already in the house, giving Scotland an 8-7 win.
"We played great out there," said Muirhead who will return to the ice with her rink in Sunday's evening session to take on Denmark.
"After going down to Sweden last night we needed to get a win on the board, but we didn't play badly yesterday and we didn't get down with ourselves. It came down to the last stone, but we fought to the end."
After two sessions of women's round-robin play, it is hosts Switzerland and 2016 silver medallists Sweden who share top spot, along with Hungary and Italy, with all four rinks unbeaten so far.
The Swiss triumphed over Germany 8-5 while Sweden needed only six ends to complete victory over Denmark, winning by 8-1.
Hungary were given a much tougher assignment to keep their unbeaten record intact, triumphing 8-7 over the Czech Republic but only after a one point steal in a tense tenth end.
And Italy also showed their battling qualities, stealing points in the seventh, eighth and ninth ends, before running Turkey out of stones in the tenth and final end for a 9-6 win.
Italy skip Diana Gaspari said: "This is a very good start for us, we have won the first two and that's more than we expected.
"We have a new team with two junior players in the front end so, it's always difficult to know how they will cope with a big competition, but they're doing very well.
"We are mentally tough. Maybe we're not so perfect with all of our shots but we always come back. The target is qualification for the worlds and we're well on the way now."
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