KOREA’S ‘GARLIC GIRLS’ GET BETTER OF GB IN BEIJING

Eve Muirhead admitted to some frustration after an opportunity to register a second victory at the Winter Olympics in Beijing slipped from her team’s grasp when they conceded four shots at the ninth end.

The match against the team who dubbed themselves the ‘Garlic Girls’ when they took the Olympics by storm on home ice in Korea four years ago, looked to have edged Team GB’s way when opposing skip EunJung Kim gifted them a steal of two, when her stone had to be removed from the ice for a hog line violation at the eighth end.

That put them ahead for the second time in the match, but that ninth end proved decisive, allowing the Koreans to run them out of stones at the final end.

“That was a frustrating one to take,” said Muirhead.

“I feel like we had a little bit of control after the eighth end and getting our steal of two.”

However, she called on her team to show the same resilience they had when they found themselves in the same situation at the Olympic Qualification Event in December, when they went on to top the table.

“We’ve got to move on,” said the skip.

“We’ve only played three games and we were in this position at the Olympic Qualification Event, so we know where we are, we know what we’ve got to do and of course we’re going to come out tomorrow firing. We just need to come out a little bit sharper from the start and get our stones in really good places.”

After missing out on the hammer, they made a promising beginning to the match, registering the first point with a steal after the opening end had been blanked.

The Koreans responded well, getting their two at the next, then a steal of their own at the fourth, but Team GB levelled things at 3-3 when Muirhead took advantage of a failed takeout attempt by her opposite number to get separation between her team’s two stones in the house, then produced a clinical takeout of her own to clinch the two.

Kim EunJung then narrowly failed with a double takeout attempt with her final stone of the sixth end which would have brought her team a four, but they still registered a two and when they held the British quartet to a single at the next, they looked to have the upper hand.

That rare hog line violation then looked to have been crucial when the Korean skip had been aiming for a promotion shot that could have resulted in getting rid of both British stones on the button. However, her team then produced a perfect end, delivering every stone with pinpoint accuracy, and when Muirhead’s attempt to recover the situation with a difficult hit-and-roll saw her shooter clip a Korean stone at the front of the house and left it sufficiently open for Kim EunJung to effect the takeout and give her team a decisive 9-6 lead heading down the final end.

“If my last (at the ninth) had curled another millimetre we were looking good with the hammer up the last end, but that’s curling. You win by inches and lose by inches,” said Muirhead.

“The angles weren’t quite in our favour and they played a good shot with their skip’s first and unfortunately my last just didn’t curl enough.

“Out there there’s no margin for error. Any errors you make you usually get crucified for them.

“Unfortunately, today we just didn’t get the rubs on our side and didn’t cotton on to the slightly straighter ice conditions early enough.

“That’s something we’ll just go back and learn from and just move on to tomorrow.”

They have some extra time to prepare for their next match against the USA which is in the evening session tomorrow and their skip said they will look to get the balance right between focusing hard on that and relaxing.

“We’ve actually got quite a bit of time until our next game, so we’ll go back, analyse this game, learn what we can do better and from what we did well,” she said.

“We’ll maybe catch up on a little bit of sleep, probably watch the boys and enjoy the time here at the Olympics until we need to switch on again tomorrow, but I don’t think there’s any breathing space here, because teams are of such high quality. That’s why they’re at the Olympic Games.”