Defeat in their final round-robin match may have denied the women who will represent Team GB at next year’s Olympics a 100 per cent record as they headed into the knockout stages, but skip Rebecca Morrison has no doubt that they are benefiting hugely from their season’s debut at the Euro Super Series in Stirling.
Competing on home ice at the National Curling Academy, Morrison, Jen Dodds, Sophie Sinclair and Sophie Jackson got a real taste of what is to come this season when they faced two of the teams they will meet at the Winter Olympics in Milan-Cortina next year on the last day of the round-robin stages.
Victory over the Italian quartet skipped by Stefania Constantini, the reigning Olympic mixed doubles champion, duly saw them secure their place in the semi-finals before they were narrowly beaten by Denmark’s former European Champions. 
“That has been fantastic as we want to be playing the teams we will meet at the Olympics as much as we can this season and get to grips with how they play, so even though we lost to Denmark, we will go and review that game and learn from that,” said Morrison.
“We also had a great game against Constantini where we learnt so much, so we are only taking positives from today and despite that loss tonight we had a really good game.
“I think at the moment we feel that we are quite evenly matched with the teams that are here,
“Constantini’s team is just two spots ahead of us in the world rankings but we have had a really good streak against them recently and while we might not have that world ranking as they come out to these championships and prove themselves every time, on any given day we can beat each other, so it’s nice in events like this to build some momentum and some confidence.”
Having led a different line-up to victory in this event four years ago, Morrison is keen to reclaim the title, but has sights set on the longer term, too and not only the Winter Olympics.
“It would be fantastic to win this event, but we’ve said going into this weekend we just really want to put on a strong start to the season and show what we are about,” she said.
“We have huge goals for the season and it is not just about February, we have so many goals ahead of us and we will take it step by step and we want to start with a good result this weekend and show what we are about this season.”
Having also had confirmation that they will be Scotland’s representatives at the forthcoming European Championships, improving on their performance at that event last season is an early target.
“Last season we won the European bronze medal and we were just inches away from getting to the final so we are going there to win this year,” said Morrison.
“We know it is tough as you can go there and things come down to millimetres when you are playing against some of those fantastic teams, but we really want to push ourselves and not be afraid to say that we are going there to win. 
“We are just going to go for everything we can this season.”
As the only team from the host nation to reach the semi-finals of the women’s event, they face a rematch with Constantini’s Italians, while Denmark’s Team Dupont, whose victory over Morrison’s women left them with the only 100 per cent record in the competition, face Team Peterson from the USA.
It is a similar story in the men’s event, where the lone remaining Scots are World Champions and world number one ranked Team Mouat, who beat the USA’s Team Dropkin 7-3 in the quarter-finals.
World number five ranked Team Whyte went out at that stage, losing 7-0 to the Czech Republic’s Team Klima while Scottish junior champions Team Carson were beaten 7-3 by China’s Team Xu and compatriots Team Bryce lost 8-1 to the USA’s 2018 Olympic champions Team Shuster.
The men’s and women’s semi finals get underway at 8.30am and the men’s and women’s finals take place at 12.30pm.
Every game from the Euro Super Series (21-24 August) and the Stirling Mixed Doubles Invitational (25-27 August) will be live streamed on the Curling Stadium Europe Platform.
Event passes can be obtained here.
Results on Curling Zone.
British Curling teams:
Team Mouat
Bruce Mouat
Grant Hardie
Bobby Lammie
Hammy McMillan
Team Whyte
Ross Whyte
Robin Brydone
Craig Waddell
Euan Kyle
Team Waddell
Kyle Waddell
Mark Watt
Angus Bryce
Blair Haswell
Team Carson
Orrin Carson
Logan Carson
Archie Hyslop
Charlie Gibb
Team Craik
James Craik
Jake MacDonald
Fraser Swanston
Rory MacNair
Team Morrison
Sophie Jackson
Rebecca Morrison
Jennifer Dodds
Sophie Sinclair
Team Henderson
Fay Henderson
Hailey Duff
Lisa Davie
Katie McMillan
Laura Watt
Team Soutar
Callie Soutar
Eva Hare
Holly Clemie
Allison Hamilton
Team Laurie
Tia Laurie
Cara Davidson
Kirsty Gallacher
Holly Burke
Amy Mitchell
