Scotland’s Team Carson wrapped up their round-robin campaign with a 5-3 win over Germany to set themselves up for the knockout stages at the World Junior Championship in Cortina.
They will now meet Norway in the semi-finals having beaten the defending champions 8-1 when they met earlier in the week and at the end of a day that had also seen them lose narrowly to Switzerland 7-6 Orrin and Logan Carson, Archie Hyslop, Charlie Gibb and alternate Jake MacDonald felt fully prepared for that challenge.
“It was a disappointing performance from us all earlier (against Switzerland) and we never really got started,” said skip Orrin Carson in reviewing the final day of round-robin play. 
“We probably went a little bit too aggressive to begin with and probably lost the game in the first half.
“We had a good fight back in the second half of the game and we narrowly missed out in end ten, but it is what it is and we had a much better performance tonight and we are glad to get that one ticked off and over the line.”
Having put wins in the bank earlier in the week, results elsewhere meant the Scots still knew they had secured their semi-final place immediately after the meeting with the Swiss, so they could focus on areas they felt they needed to work on as they went into the meeting with Germany, which included taking the chance to get MacDonald onto the ice for the first time.
“We were just trying to familiarise ourselves with the ice and make sure we are ready for tomorrow and we played a pretty solid game and hopefully we can take that into tomorrow,” said Carson.
“Whenever you win a game it gives you confidence going into the next one and that is exactly what we have got now and we are really looking forward to the semi final tomorrow against Norway.
“It was good to get Jake on this week and he played really well and he slotted in perfectly and you would think he had been in the team for a year so I was really happy with how he played.”
Playing in their third World Junior Championship together, the Carsons, Hyslop and Gibb missed out on the play-offs last year, but claimed a bronze medal on their debut in 2023, so can draw on that experience.
“We have been in this position once before and obviously it didn’t go our way and we are going to try and rectify that tomorrow,” said Carson.
“It’s going to be a whole new competition and we know we are going into it starting without hammer, but we will look to try and flip that early and hopefully come out with the result we are looking for.”
They can, too, take inspiration from compatriots Team Mouat, the World number one ranked men’s team who, after a difficult time in the round-robin stages at the World Men’s Championship a fortnight ago, defied the odds to reclaim the World title. 
“Team Mouat had an incredible week out in Canada and their round robin maybe didn’t go how they wanted either but they played every play-off game starting without the hammer and they went on to win gold,” Carson noted.
“Hopefully we can replicate what they did and we are really looking forward to getting going tomorrow.”
With all matches being live streamed on The Curling Channel, they meet Norway at 2.30pm (BST).
The World Junior Curling Championships runs from 12-21 April.
Watch streamed games on The Curling Channel
Schedule:
Sunday 13 April
Session 2
Scotland – USA 11-10
Session 3
Scotland – Korea 9-7(EE)
Monday 14 April
Session 4
Scotland – Norway 8-1
Tuesday 15 April
Session 6
Scotland – Denmark 8-7 (EE)
Wednesday 16 April
Session 7
Scotland – Italy 4-9
Thursday 17 April
Session 8
Scotland – Japan 9-4
Friday 18 April
Session 10
Scotland – Canada 7-9
Saturday 19 April
Session 11
Scotland-Switzerland 6-7
Session 12
Scotland – Germany 5-3
Sunday 20 April
Semi finals
Monday 21 April
Final and bronze medal game
Team Scotland
Orrin Carson
Logan Carson
Archie Hyslop
Charlie Gibb
Jake MacDonald
Images: @curlipicsphoto
