Sweden stretches win streak to eight at Ford World Women’s

NORTH BAY, Ont. — Sweden’s Anna Hasselborg is a step closer to locking down a playoff berth at the 2018 Ford World Women’s Curling Championship.

Anna Hasselborg directs her teammates during Wednesday morning’s victory over Germany. (Photo, Curling Canada/Michael Burns)

Hasselborg’s Stockholm team, which won the Olympic gold medal last month in Gangneung, South Korea, cruised to an 8-4 win over Germany’s Daniela Jentsch (1-6) on Wednesday morning at the North Bay Memorial Gardens.

With the victory, Hasselborg, vice-skip Sara McManus, second Agnes Knochenhauer, lead Sofia Mabergs, alternate Jennie Wählin, team coach Maria Prytz and national coach Peja Lindholm improved to 8-0 and two full games clear of the field in the 13-team round-robin standings. Canada’s Jennifer Jones, who had a bye on Wednesday morning, also is unbeaten at 6-0.

The Swedes opened with a second-end deuce against Germany, surrendered one in the third end, took control with two in the fourth end and a stolen deuce in the fifth.

In other action on Wednesday morning, South Korea’s EunJung Kim stole a 9-8 victory over Jamie Sinclair of the United States (3-4) to improve to 6-1 and firmly in the race for a high seeding in the six-team playoffs that begin Saturday.

South Korean skip EunJung Kim calls to her sweepers. (Photo, Curling Canada/Michael Burns)

The Koreans scored a 10th-end deuce to tie the game, and stole one in the 11th when Sinclair was heavy on her draw to the four-foot for the victory.

In the other morning games, two-time world champ Binia Feltscher of Switzerland (3-4) rallied from a 4-1 deficit to beat Denmark’s Angelina Jensen (1-6) 7-5, and Scotland’s Hanna Fleming (2-6) stole three in the eighth end for a 10-7 win over Japan’s Tori Koana (3-4).

Besides Canada, Russia’s Victoria Moiseeva (4-2), Anna Kubešková of the Czech Republic (4-3), China’s Yilun Jiang (3-4) and Italy’s Diana Gaspari (2-5) had byes on Wednesday morning.

The 2018 Ford World Women’s Curling Championship continues with draws Wednesday at 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. (all times ET).

Live scoring, standings and statistics for the 2018 Ford World Women’s are available at www.worldcurling.org/wwcc2018/livescores

TSN and RDS2 will provide complete coverage of Canada’s games at the 2018 Ford World Women’s. Go to www.tsn.ca/2017-18-curling-broadcast-schedule-1.593081 for the complete schedule.

For ticket information for the 2018 Ford World Women’s, go to www.curling.ca/2018worldwomen/tickets/

This story will be available in French as soon as possible at www.curling.ca/2018worldwomen/?lang=fr