Sweden lost curling to Great Britain

Beijing. After just a day on Chinese dirt, Almeida de Val and Oscar Erickson entered mixed doubles.

A true nightmare tour pits a Swedish curling pair against favorite Great Britain.

“I missed all three stones and it made it really hard for Almeida,” says Erickson as he criticizes himself.

The Olympic Games are underway in Sweden. He started curling and was the first mixed duo team made up of Almeida de Val and Oscar Eriksson.

There was a loss in the first match against favorites Great Britain after chaotic preparations to say the least.

Because there was great drama before Almeida de Val and Oscar Erickson got the green light to go to the Olympics. The result of the Swedish captain’s mixed doubles test was positive.

The time difference is seven hours

The captain was not allowed to go, but after several negative test results from the Swedish pair, they finally had a chance.

But de Waal and Ericsson only arrived in Beijing on Tuesday and played their first game in the tournament already during Wednesday.

– We would not have been allowed to train more even if we had come earlier, but on the other hand, the flights were delayed and we were able to relax in the village, says de Val.

With a body time difference of seven hours and only a little over a day, he waited for the strongest opposition possible in the first match.

Team world number one Great Britain champion Bruce Mowat is a hot gold candidate.

– Challenging opening match against world champions. Ericsson says it’s always a little difficult in the first game of the tournament, especially when we’ve played so hard in just one day.

I lost all three stones.

And in the seventh round, the lack of preparation took its toll.

After six of the eight rounds it was 5-5, but then most things went wrong for the Swede pair. Great Britain managed to pull back to 8-5 and won the match 9-5.

– It was my three pebbles that put the pebbles into the machine. We got a good position with an equal stone and another. Erickson, who wasn’t frustrated afterwards, says:

– We knew it was going to be difficult. We hope to learn from this and improve during the tournament.

Mixed doubles curling made their Olympic debut four years ago, but this was the first time a Swedish pair competed at the Olympics.

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