Olympic silver medallists Team Murdoch have confirmed their recent return to form with victory at the German Masters in Hamburg.
Having ended 2015 with their biggest win of the year at the Karuizawa International in Japan last month this was another victory over a high class field which included Sweden’s world and European champions Team Edin and the Scottish quartet, who also won this event in 2013, had to overcome a punishing schedule.
Having won their opening two round-robin matches on Thursday and Friday they were beaten by both Korea’s Team Kim and Switzerland’s Team Michel in their first two matches on Saturday forcing them to play an extra match to earn a place in the semi-finals.
They came through that, however, against Denmark’s Team Stjerne and showed real resilience to win their fourth match of the day against Norway’s Team Hoiberg, coming off the ice some 13 and half hours after their first had got underway.
Finals day pitted them against the two teams that had previously beaten them but they maintained their momentum by seeing off Team Michel in the semi-final before beating Team Kim 5-4 in the final after going into the final end a shot behind.
“We’re obviously delighted with another win on the tour with a strong field,” skip Dave Murdoch said afterwards.
“Our form recently had been exemplary and again this weekend we showed great determination to continue this trend.”
The highly experienced three time Olympian believes that they are timing their run well ahead of what they have targeted as the key part of the season when they contest the national championships which they have to win if they are to return to the World Championships for the first time since contesting the Winter Olympic final in Sochi.
“With the Scottish Championship a few weeks away we feel we have great confidence in our play and we hope we carry this forward and achieve our goals for the rest of the season,” said Murdoch.
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