Para-curlers knocked out before medal matches

Aileen Neilson’s Team GB curlers’ medal hopes disappeared yesterday with two defeats on the final round-robin day at the Winter Paralympics.

When Neilson and teammates Angie Malone, Bob Mcpherson, Gregor Ewan and Hugh Nibloe lost 5-4 to hosts South Korea and Norway’ beat Slovakia, the dream was over.

Salt was then rubbed into the wound when they lost 9-3 to China, though skip Neilson knows the damage was done a long time ago.

She said: “We’re obviously extremely disappointed, we looked to be on that podium at the end of the week and we’re not, we didn’t win the matches that we set out to win.

“The games should have been won before the final day. We wanted to be okay heading into the last round-robin. We didn’t execute as well as we know we can. These are the games which we were looking at and where it didn’t go to plan.

“The other teams, when they were playing us, were playing really well and we weren’t able to capitalise on any mistakes that they made.”

The Sochi 2014 bronze medallist added: “We’re all gutted but we have to learn from it. We’ll go and have a bit of time off and then we’ll look at the competition, look at how we played and the schedule, we’ll look at our tactics and the dynamics and absolutely everything will be analysed.

“We’ve got the World Championships in Scotland in 2019 to look forward to. We’ll certainly be working hard before then to get us back to where we can get to.

“Each individual will assess where they want to be. Our focus was solely on the Paralympics but people will have their own individual things to decide and we’ll take that on once we’ve had time to have a break.” l Sainsbury’s is a proud long-term supporter of the British Paralympic Association and a champion of inclusive sport for all. For more information on Sainsbury’s commitment to inclusive sport visit http:// www.j-sainsbury.co.uk/