Eve Muirhead made a little bit of Scottish sporting history when she led her team to a 6-5 win over Sweden to become only the second Scottish female skip to be crowned world champion, in yesterday's final at the Titlis Glacier Mountain World Women's Curling Championship in Riga, Latvia.
Because they had topped the round-robin, Sweden started with last stone advantage and used it to blank the first end before successfully taking 2 in the second end when their fourth player Maria Prytz had a nose-hit.
Scotland opened with a single in the third end when Muirhead got round a guard to tap up one of her own stones just inside the Swedish stone that had been lying shot. The Scots then made a breakthrough in the fourth end when Prytz just feathered a guard to leave two Scottish stones intact in the house for a steal of 2 and a 4-3 lead.
The teams then traded singles throughout the rest of the game. In the fifth, Prytz had to draw to the four- foot ring to score, and in the sixth Muirhead was forced to draw for 1. Sweden were denied a score of 2 in the seventh by the umpire's measure and, in the eighth, when she was trying to draw to score 2, Muirhead's last stone touched a guard and she had to settle for 1 again.
In the ninth, Scotland once again prevented Sweden from building anything and Prytz had to settle for a draw for a single point. In the tenth, Muirhead was able to pick out the Swedish stone that lay shot, leaving her own near it to count for the 1 that handed her the title.
This result means that Muirhead and her squad – Anna Sloan, second Vicki Adams, lead Claire Hamilton, supported by alternate Lauren Gray and coach David Hay – follow in the footsteps of Jackie Lockhart, who won the world title in 2002.
A delighted Muirhead said: "It's still not sunk in. The girls played great today. To come out on the top is an unbelievable feeling, especially for myself, getting that silver medal in 2010 and silver at the Europeans this year. To top our season off by becoming world champions just feels great."
About the game itself, she added: "We knew it was going to be close and we knew it could come down to last end, last stone. We were ready for that. We played a great last end there, Anna played that great double-rip that locked it up for us and left me a pretty simple shot."
Meanwhile Margaretha Sigfridsson, who skips and plays lead stone for Sweden, was gracious in defeat.
"Of course, it's sad [to lose]," she said. "We've had a really good week but, unfortunately, we weren't sharp enough today. We played a very good game but Eve was a little bit better."
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