The world mixed doubles opens in Oestersund

In their first game at the world championship, New Zealand pulled off an extra-end win against the Olympians from Japan 7-6.

In the eighth end, New Zealand had a take-out for three points, and the win, but scored just a single point forcing an extra-end. Satsuki Fujisawa was then light on her final draw to the button for the winning point, handing the victory to New Zealand.

Guyana appeared in their world mixed doubles debut against Germany. Despite a back and forth effort, Germany won 8-6.

Czech Republic scored single stolen points in four ends against Brazil, guiding them to a 6-1 victory.

In the remaining matches, Switzerland won convincingly against Slovenia 10-2 and Estonia over Poland 8-5.

[Pictured below: Team New Zealand | Photo © WCF / Tom Rowland]

Russia began their world championship by scoring four points in the first end against Lithuania and continued to roll to a 11-1 win after seven ends.

Hungary bounced back to beat England despite being down four points after three ends. The Hungarians broke the game open with three points in the fourth end, followed by eight stolen points to win 11-4.

Norway won their opener against Romania 7-2 after steals of single points in the sixth end seventh ends.

In other games, Spain held on against Hong Kong, winning 6-4 and Turkey beat Belarus 9-6 with a strong second half finish.

[Pictured below: Team Hungary | Photo © WCF / Tom Rowland]

Canada began their world championship with a 12-0 win over Ireland in six ends in today's second session of round-robin play in the Östersund Arena.

Canada opened the scoring with five points in the first end, then followed that with steals of two points in the second end, single-point steals in the third, fourth and fifth ends, before sealing their win with a further two-point steal in the sixth end.

Korea started their competition with an 11-2 win over Austria. Korea opened the game with a steal of four points in the first end, before stealing three points in the second end and stealing another two points in the third end on the way to their win.

Elsewhere in the session, Finland defeated Kazakhstan 7-5 after using their power-play in the eighth end, when the game was level at 5-5, to score two points, China defeated France 10-6 and hosts Sweden recorded a 10-2 win over Slovakia scoring in all but one end of their game.

[pictured below: Canada's Kirk Muyres | Photo © WCF / Tom Rowland]

The World Mixed Doubles Curling Championship 2018 opening session on Saturday (21 April) morning saw wins for Denmark, Italy, Latvia, Scotland and United States.

After trading single points in the first two ends with Israel, Scotland scored six points in the third end to record the first six-ender of the competition and take a 7-2 lead. Scotland then stole five points over the next three ends after which Israel conceded with the score 12-1 to Scotland.

United States recorded the competitions second six-ender in their game against Luxembourg. Leading 8-2 going into the sixth end, United States scored the six points after which Luxembourg conceded giving United States a 14-2 victory.

Elsewhere in the session Denmark beat Croatia 15-2 after seven ends, Italy ran Australia out of stones to win 8-4 and Latvia beat Netherlands 7-4.

Session one: Netherlands 4-7 Latvia; Australia 4-8 Italy; Luxembourg 2-14 United States; Croatia 2-15 Denmark; Scotland 12-1 Israel.

Session two: Korea 11-2 Austria; Kazakhstan 5-7 Finland; Ireland 0-12 Canada; France 6-10 China; Slovakia 2-10 Sweden

Session three: England 4-11 Hungary; Romania 2-7 Norway; Russia 11-1 Lithuania; Belarus 6-9 Turkey; Spain 6-4 Hong Kong

Session four: Japan 6-7 New Zealand; Guyana 6-8 Germany; Poland 5-8 Estonia; Slovenia 2-10 Switzerland; Brazil 1-6 Czech Republic

Athlete quotes from the opening day can be found at http://www.worldcurling.org/wmdcc2018/day-one-quotes

For up-to-date standings from each group in the championship visit http://www.worldcurling.org/wmdcc2018/livescores

To engage with the World Curling Federation on social media in the build to the World Mixed Doubles Curling Championship 2018 follow it on Twitter, Instagram (@worldcurling) and Facebook (/WorldCurlingFederation) and use the hashtags when posting: #WMDCC2018 #curling