Gripping Republic of Korea match ends in defeat for wheelchair curlers

ParalympicsGB’s wheelchair curlers cannot now reach the semi-finals after losing a gripping match to the Republic of Korea 8-6 on Day 5 of competition at the Ice Cube.

Having recorded three wins and four defeats in their first seven matches of the round robin the British team had no room for error if they were to stay in contention for a precious semi-final place.

With David Melrose ruled out due to injury Gary Smith joined skip Hugh Nibloe, Gregor Ewan and Meggan Dawson-Farrell for the crucial tie.

Korea scored three with the hammer in the opening end and ParalympicsGB scored one in the next but Korea then replied with two to take a 5-1 lead.

Some excellent play from Gregor Ewan saw ParalympicsGB reduce the deficit with consecutive one point ends to leave the score 5-4 in Korea’s favour. Korea than scored two with the hammer to extend their lead once more.

The British team hit back with a two in the seventh and in the final end the tension really built before Sunghun Jung produced a wonderful shot to win the match and end ParalympicsGB’s hopes of reaching the last four.

Skip Hugh Nibloe said: “It’s disappointing, it’s not what we came here for to finish up so early. We are quite a young team, with three players at their first Paralympics, other teams have played together for years and years. Other teams have punished us and we have not been as clinical in punishing them.

“I thought we were well prepared coming out, we did a good camp - maybe as a young team not having the opportunity to travel and get the games under our belt perhaps didn’t help us.

“Inconsistency has really bit us this week I don’t think we ever had all four players playing well together.

“We’ve now got three more Paralympians in the squad and they are going to go back and tell everyone how good it is to represent Great Britain and ParalympicsGB and we can maybe find a couple of players and come back with a stronger squad.

“For the integrity of the competition we want to keep going tomorrow and get another couple of wins to move up the standings.”