By Aadi Nair
CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy, Feb 14 (Reuters) – Yannick Schwaller’s Switzerland continued their perfect start at the Milano Cortina Winter Olympics on Saturday, beating Brad Jacobs’s Canada 9-5 to remain the only undefeated team in the men’s competition.
Switzerland’s fourth Benoit Schwarz-van Berkel threw with superb accuracy to restrict Canada whenever they had the hammer, while also ensuring his own team kept the scoreboard ticking over.
“He’s an amazing player. He’s always been. There’s not a lot of guys that I want to have throwing fourth rocks for me,” Schwaller said of Schwarz-van Berkel.
“I’m very happy with him. First of all, he’s a great human being. It’s fun to play with him. If he’s in the zone like today and we’re understanding each other well, it’s so easy.”
Switzerland top the standings with four wins from four, ahead of Canada and Britain in joint second.
Canada had won their first three matches, including a victory over Olympic champions Sweden in a heated clash on Friday in which they were accused of cheating.
Sweden were also in action on Saturday, picking up their first win by beating China 6-4, while tournament favourites Britain defeated the Czech Republic 7-4.
CANADA LOSE TO BRITAIN AND SWITZERLAND
Pre-tournament favourites Canada, the two-times world champions, suffered defeats to Britain and Switzerland in the women’s competition.
They are the top-ranked team in the world, but skip Rachel Homan’s record at the Olympics is poor.
She has participated in the past two Games, finishing outside the qualification spots for the semi-finals on both occasions.
Their defeat to Switzerland was overshadowed by an incident involving double touching in the first end, which resulted in one of Homan’s rocks being removed from play.
Silvana Tirinzoni’s Switzerland returned to winning ways by beating Canada 8-7 after losing 7-5 to Japan earlier on Saturday, while Britain’s victory over Canada gave them their first win of the competition.
Hosts Italy suffered back-to-back defeats, going down 8-7 to China and 8-6 to Sweden, who have made a roaring start to the competition and top the table with four straight wins.
Teams play nine matches in the round-robin stage, which continues on Sunday. The top four advance to the semi-finals next week.
(Reporting by Aadi Nair, editing by Ed Osmond and Clare Fallon-)
Comments