Team Whyte held their nerve to claim the Aberdeen International title at Curl Aberdeen.
Ross Whyte, Robin Brydone, Duncan McFadzean and Euan Kyle went through the pool stages unbeaten before eliminating Germany’s Benny Kapp in the quarter-final to earn their place in the last four.
The semi-final pitted them against Team Mouat, with whom Whyte has won a string of major medals as their fifth player at the Olympics and at European and World Championships.
With their vice skip Grant Hardie unavailable over the weekend, Bruce Mouat, Bobby Lammie and Hammy McMillan had also come through their group with a 100 per cent record and remained highly competitive in a hard fought battle which saw half of the ends blanked and no more than a single scored in any of the rest as the teams finished level at 2-2 after the scheduled eight ends.
Never behind to that stage, however, Team Whyte held their nerve at the extra end to set up a meeting with Italy’s Team Retornaz, following their 7-3 semi-final defeat of another of Scotland’s rinks Team Waddell.
The opening exchanges of the final suggested it might be a very different encounter with multiple scores at the first two ends, Whyte scoring two at the opener, then Retornaz responding with a three at the next.
Forced to a single at the third end, Whyte then regained the initiative with a steal at the fourth to move 4-3 ahead and it turned into another arm wrestle from that point.
A blanked fifth end was followed by exchanges of singles at the next three, to take it into extra time once more and with final stone advantage the Scottish quartet was up to the task once again.
A very close affair
“The final was a very close and intense battle with Team Retornaz as they have had a great season this year and we always knew it was going to be a very tough match, however it’s really nice to get out and get that win over them,” said Whyte.
“It was a very close affair all the way to the extra end with a nice steal in end four which helped us on our way to the victory.”
Whyte added: “Beating Grand Slam winners is never easy and Mouat has now a number of those to his name, while Retornaz won one earlier this year, so it feels really good to be on top of the competition where they are in the field.
“This is a good step towards the end of the season and we are looking to progress on this and try to get a couple of good runs in the last two Slams of the year, hopefully allowing us to go on and go deep in both of those competitions for some extra ranking points.”
Disappointment for Morrison
Meanwhile, Scotland’s Team Morrison were left ruing missed opportunities after two tough losses on the second day of action at the LGT World Women’s Curling Championships in Sweden.
Aberdonian Rebecca Morrison, Gina Aitken, Sophie Sinclair and Sophie Jackson looked to have put themselves in positions to win both matches against European champions Denmark and Pan-Continental champions Japan, only to make late mistakes that allowed their opponents to steal the wins from them.
The Scots suffered a 9-7 loss against the Danes in the morning but looked on course to bounce back against Japan later in the day.
They looked to be in charge throughout after a steal at the third end had put them into a 4-1 lead.
That was built into a 6-2 advantage at the halfway break and when they stole again at the seventh end they were five shots ahead with just four ends to play.
🏴From a commanding position after six ends Scotland suffer a 9-8 defeat to Japan @worldcurling Champs in Sweden.
Scotland look to bounce back when they play Korea and Canada tomorrow.
📸WCF/Jeffrey Au#curling #WWCC2023 pic.twitter.com/0PMVowymtB— British Curling (@BritishCurling) March 19, 2023
However, Japan’s Olympic silver medallists stuck to their task as they fought their way into range with a two at the seventh end, then stole at the next to make it 7-5.
Scottish nerves looked to have been settled when they scored at the ninth end to take a three shot lead into the last, but they got themselves into difficulties and when Morrison’s bid to make a double takeout with her last stone narrowly missed, Satstuki Fujisawa was left with a straightforward takeout to claim the four which brought her team a 9-8 win.
“It is hard to come away today with two losses,” admitted World Championship debutant Morrison.
“I feel like we deserved a little bit more than that in the end, but we just didn’t finish the games off, which is what you need to do at this level, so it’s a tough one to take.”