Silver medals for Swiss curling team
Switzerland's men's team have finished their world championship campaign with silver medals after losing 6-3 to Sweden in a tense final match in Lausanne.
In an edgy opening sequence, both sides took single points from the ends where they held last stone advantage, giving Sweden a narrow 2-1 lead after three ends.
The next four ends finished blank as Switzerland, under skip Christof Schwaller, waited for the moment to strike. In the seventh end, they chose to take a point which put them back on level terms but surrendered the last stone of the eighth end to Sweden.
That was to prove costly, with Peter Lindholm’s experienced Swedish side nudging Switzerland’s last stone out of the house and grabbing three points in the process.
Trailing 5-2 with two ends remaining, Switzerland could only hold one point in the penultimate end.
Needing to score two without the last stone in the final end, Switzerland were again taken out by the Swedes, leaving Schwaller to concede the match 6-3.
Despite Sunday’s defeat, the Swiss team from Biel have far exceeded expectations this week. Chasing a place in the semi-finals to guarantee themselves a place at next year’s Winter Olympics, the Swiss men reached their target and then some.
By going on to beat hot favourites Canada in Saturday’s semi-final the Swiss team have raised hopes of an Olympic medal in Salt Lake City to follow the gold won by Lausanne’s Patrick Hürlimann in Nagano.
by Mark Ledsom
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