Canada advances to Saturday’s Page 3-4 game at Capital One World Women’s

Canada’s Amber Holland has advanced to Saturday’s Page 3-4 game against Denmark after beating Switzerland’s Mirjam Ott, 8-6 Friday morning in a tiebreaker for fourth place. Holland started out in complete control of the contest at the Capital One World Women’s in Esbjerg, Denmark, taking two in the second and stealing one in the third end. After Ott scored a deuce in the fourth, Holland responded with her own pair for a 5-2 lead at the break. It was 7-3 for Canada until Ott counted three in the eighth end as Switzerland narrowed the margin to just a single point, 7-6. But a blanked ninth end, followed by a precise draw to the button by Holland with her last rock in the 10th gave Canada the well-deserved win. Afterwards, Holland, who held an 85-72 shooting percentage edge over Ott, said, “That’s number one target achieved. Obviously we had to win that to get to where we needed to in the play-offs. On her miscue in the eighth that gave Switzerland three, Holland explained, “I just over-swept my first shot. You don’t like giving up a three, but we were up four, so if there is any time to do it, that’s the time. And one up playing the ninth end with hammer is still pretty comfortable. “The girls played really well. They had a lot of ends tied up and set up for me and that took the pressure off. I just needed to finish a few off – some I did, some I didn’t. We can win this title, why not? We just have to keep putting good games together and keep doing what we’re doing and stay consistent.” Said a now-eliminated Ott, “We feel disappointed – we wanted to win. We had a good game but they played really well. We were a little bit unlucky today – but we tried hard and we had a good game.” Holland will now face Denmark’s Lene Nielsen in the Page 3-4 game Saturday at 5:00 am ET (live on TSN), with the winner advancing to the semi-final, the loser going to Sunday’s bronze medal game. Denmark, Canada and Switzerland had finished with 7-4 records, but Denmark was awarded third place since it had beaten both in the round robin, including an 8-5 decision over Canada last Sunday. Sweden’s Anette Norberg faces China’s Bingyu Wang at 2:00 pm ET today (live on TSN) in the Page 1-2 game. The winner advances to Sunday’s gold medal game, while the loser goes to Saturday’s semi-final. Norberg is a two-time world and Olympic champion, while Wang captured the 2009 world women’s title.