International Medals, Part 2
I hope you enjoyed reading the first part of this blog about the medals won by England’s teams at International (World and European) Championships in which we discussed the first 9 sets of medals won between 1976 and 2006. When we left it the women had just won the Bronze medals in the European B Division at Basel in Switzerland, their second successive bronzes.
10 - 2007 European Championship, B Division, Fussen (Women) – Gold
There were familiar faces in the team that travelled to Fussen in the South of Germany for the 2007 European Championships and at the end of it all the women’s team of Kirsty Balfour, Caroline Reed, Claire Grimwood, Sarah McVey and Joan Reed at last won the gold medals that they had, in various combinations, been close to winning in previous years. It was Kirsty’s first year of skipping at this level and she took over from Joan Reed who moved to alternate, with her daughter, Caroline coming into the team at third.
This year there were 13 teams in the B Division and they were divided into a group of 7 and a group of 6, and England were in the latter. One of the surprises was the presence of Norway in the other group after they had been relegated in 2006 for the first time. Skipped by the great Dordi Nordby, who was playing in her 25th European Championship, they would be the favourites to win the Division and head up back to Division A.
Old rivals, the Netherlands, skipped by Shari Leibbrandt-Demmon were the first opposition and this low-scoring game eventually went to the Dutch by 4-3. With only 5 games to be played and only 2 qualifying every win would be vital and so the next game against Poland was very important, even this early in the competition. A steal of 2 in the 7th end was the crucial point in the game as it gave us an 8-4 lead and the game finished at 9-5.
Three more wins against Slovakia (11-6), Latvia (11-4) and Croatia (11-3) meant that we finished second in the table, but only because the Netherlands had beaten us as they had surprisingly lost to Latvia at an extra end and finished level on 4 wins.
So this gave us a semi-final against Norway who not surprisingly had been undefeated in winning the other group, while the Netherlands faced France in the other semi-final. At this point in time England’s women had played Norway 16 times over the years and the last time they had won had been in 1977 with past defeats including scores of 7-18, 1-14 and 1-15 (twice) and so it was perhaps with a touch of overconfidence that Dordi led her team onto the ice.
What then followed was one of the great moments in English curling history and it is worthwhile looking at the details. Having won the hammer for the first end England blanked but then Norway stole a shot in the second and we then blanked the third before taking 2 in the 4th; Norway scored 1 in the 5th and then stole from us again in the 6th to go 3-2 up. We were forced to take a single in the 7th but then stole in the 8th to go 4-3 up! This was nail-biting stuff and unfortunately I missed it as I had had to go home early from the Championships!! In the 9th end we forced Norway to a single shot and so it was into the last end, all square with the hammer. Sixteen stones later it was all over and England had won by 5 shots to 4 for a famous and outstanding victory and promotion back up to the A Division. It was also the last appearance by Dordi Nordby in International competition as the Norwegians did not turn up for the bronze-medal game against France.
Of course there was still a final to be played and now the aim was not only to win the final and the gold medals but also, by doing so, it would give us a crack at getting to the World Championships via play-off games against the Czech Republic who had finished 8th in Division A. The final was against the Netherlands who had been the only team to beat us all week and this started off with neither team willing to go on the offensive so that the score after 5 ends was just 2-1 for England.
However a big steal of 3 for England in the 6th end seemed to have turned the game in their favour but the Dutch came back strongly so that going into the last end it was all square at 6-6 with England having the hammer. Once again, as in the semi against Norway, supporters’ nerves were on edge but on the ice a score of 2 was enough to win the first set of gold medals for England at any level.
Unfortunately the World Championships proved out of reach as the Czech Republic won the right to go by beating us 9-7 and 11-6.
Claire Grimwood, Caroline Reed, Kirsty Balfour, Joan Reed, Sarah McVey
I have spent quite a while describing this competition as it really was a highlight for English curling up to that time, not just the fact that the gold medals had been won but also the manner in which they had been won by winning two close games at the tenth end against 2 very good teams.
From this point the women spent two years in the A Division before returning to the B in 2010.
11 - 2009 European Mixed Championship, Prague – Bronze
The next set of medals for England came in the recently established European Mixed Championship. This was begun in 2005 as a much more social competition than the high-pressure European Men’s and Women’s Championships though it quickly developed into a major event in its own right with the majority of the European Member Associations participating.
Alan Macdougall had been our representative ever since the first year (though we had not entered in 2006) and he was joined in 2009 by Lana Watson, Andrew Reed and Suzie Law. The same team had finished 11th in 2007 and 10th in 2008 (when John Sharp replaced Andrew Reed).
The 24 teams were divided into 3 groups of 8 and by the end of the round-robin England sat on top of the Yellow Group, undefeated after wins over Russia (3-2 after extra end), Sweden (7-4), Austria (5-4 after extra end), Ireland (8-1), Italy (9-3), Norway (8-2) and Serbia (22-0). This led to a semi-final against a Danish team who had been runners-up to the surprise Welsh winners in 2007.
Denmark had the hammer in the first end which they blanked and then they took 2 in the second end. Singles were exchanged in 3 and 4 and England blanked 5 and 6 before being forced to take their one in the 7th end to leave the score at 3-2 for Denmark who scored 1 with the hammer to progress to the final while England faced the Czech Republic for the bronze. Another close game with no score greater than one in any end, but 3 steals helped England to a 5-1 lead after 6 before they lost the 7th and the 8th to win the bronze medals by 5-3.
The same team returned for the 2010 edition at Greenacres where they finished 4th after losing play-off games to Switzerland and Germany.
Alan MacDougall, Lana Watson, Andrew Reed, Suzie Law
12 - 2011 European Championship, B Division, Moscow (Men) – Bronze
By the time the teams rolled into Moscow for the European Championships in 2011 it had been 7 years since England’s men had last won medals and in that time they had seen the women win 2 bronzes and a gold. In 2010 Alan MacDougall, Andrew Reed, Andrew Woolston and Tom Jaeggi began a run of 7 consecutive appearances at the European Championships with a disappointing 3-4 record on poor ice at Champery. For Moscow they had invited John Brown along as coach / alternate.
Owing to the increasing number of nations participating in the B Division the WCF had introduced a C Division in 2010 and had restricted the number of men’s teams in the B Division to 16, divided into 2 groups of 8. So now, as well as trying to gain promotion to the A Division, teams also had to try and avoid relegation to the C Division.
This hurdle was easily overcome by England as they finished second in their group behind Ireland who had beaten them 8-1, but this was set against wins over Estonia (7-6 after extra end), Poland (9-2), Belgium (8-4), Wales (9-6), Netherlands (5-4) and Croatia (9-1). A Page play-off system was being used and this meant that England faced Russia who had finished 2nd in the other group and unfortunately the game was lost by 6-2 and this put us into a bronze medal game against Ireland who had lost play-offs against Hungary and Russia. In a reverse of the earlier game England won this by 8-4 and Alan and Andrew added European men’s bronzes to the Mixed ones they had won 2 years before.
Tom Jaeggi, Andrew Woolston, Alan MacDougall, John Brown, Andrew Reed
13 - 2013 European Championship, B Division, Stavanger (Women) – Bronze
After the 2007 gold medals there had been a fallow period for the England women in the A Division, and then for a few years in the B Division, as the golden team gradually retired, but by the time the 2013 European Championships in Stavanger came around a new generation of young women curlers had come up through the junior programme at Fenton’s Rink.
Anna Fowler had experienced her first European Championships in Moscow in 2011 under the leadership of the experienced Fiona Hawker who you may remember first won bronze with Joan Reed back in 2000 and then silver in 2002. Now Anna had joined with her junior team mates, Hetty Garnier, Naomi Robinson, Lauren Pearce and Lucy Sparks
Since the C Division had been introduced the B Division for women was limited to 10 teams which meant a substantial programme of 9 round robin games to be negotiated. It started promisingly with three wins against Slovenia (15-3), Belarus (10-4) and Poland (7-5) but then Turkey struck the first dent in the armour with a 7-4 win. Two more hard fought wins followed against Austria (8-7) and Spain (7-5) before another hiccup with defeats by Hungary (4-6) and Estonia (6-7) left them on a 5-3 record and needing to win their last game against Finland.
The Finns had been relegated the previous year and had lost just 1 game so far against Estonia, who were to finish top of the standings, so it was not going to be easy. England got off to a flying start with a couple of 2s and maintained a lead at half time of 6-2 which they stretched a little before being pegged back to 9-7 going down the last with hammer, from which they took a 1 and a 10-7 victory.
This left them in third after the round robin and the Page 3 / 4 game against Austria was next up. This was a high scoring game which hung in the balance with Austria leading 7-6 after 7 before a pair of 3s gave England a 12-7 win. This then led to a semi-final against Estonia which was lost 2-7 and therefore it was back to another game against Austria for the bronze medal. It was a game where England were always ahead after the second end and they held on to beat the Austrians for the third time in a week, this time by 7-5.
This was to be the last set of medals won by the women’s team to date though there have been 4th places in 2015 (lost to Latvia), 2019 (lost to Hungary) and 2021 (lost to Hungary again).
John Sharp (Coach), Lucy Sparks, Lauren Pearce, Naomi Robinson, Hetty Garnier, Anna Fowler
14 - 2014 European Junior Championship, Lohja (Women) – Bronze
Just a few weeks after winning bronze medals at the European B Championship as described above, Hetty Garnier, Naomi Robinson and Lucy Sparks were off to the European Junior Championships in Finland where they were joined by Angharad Ward and Niamh Fenton. This was the 6th European Juniors for Hetty and Naomi and they still had one more to come.
The 12 teams were split into 2 groups of 7 and England got off to a bad start in their first game when they failed to finish the game in their allotted time while 4-6 down to Hungary – an important lesson learnt. After that however, the other 5 games resulted in victories against Germany (4-3), Latvia (7-2), Estonia (5-4), Finland (13-0) and Norway (8-2) which left them 2nd in group behind Hungary and with a semi-final against Italy to come. Unfortunately the Italians were too strong on this occasion racing into a 7-0 lead by half time and eventually winning by 9-2.
This left just the bronze medal game against Poland and things did not look too good at 4-6 after 6 ends but a run of singles in 7, 8 and an extra end saw them squeeze through by 7-6 and the first medals for one of our junior teams.
Lucy Sparks, Naomi Robinson, Hetty Garnier, Angharad Ward, Niamh Fenton (photo is from 2013 in Prague).
15 - 2014 European Championship, B Division, Champery (Men) – Bronze
It was a quick return to Champery for Alan MacDougall, Andrew Reed, Andrew Woolston and Tom Jaeggi who were joined on this occasion by our junior skip Ben Fowler at alternate. The two years since Moscow had seen a 4th place in Karlstad (lost to Netherlands) and an 8th in Stavanger and the team travelled to Switzerland hoping that the ice in the Monthey arena was going to be better than 4 years previously.
As normal the B Division was divided into 2 groups of 8 but France withdrew at the last minute and so England were left in a group of 7 instead. The first game was against Lithuania who we had never lost to and the run continued with a 7-3 win. Four more close wins followed against Netherlands (7-5), Croatia (7-6), Turkey (6-5) and Estonia (7-5) meaning that we were guaranteed to finish top of the group. The final game was our first ever against Israel and with Alan MacDougall resting on the bench the team lost a game they had never been in charge of by 6-7.
The Page 1 / 2 game was against Finland and although we held them to 2-3 at half time they ran away to win by 8-2 after 9 ends. So a semi-final was next against Netherlands and this was over by the 5th end when a 6 was lost and we were down by 2-9. The 6th end was blanked but unfortunately play-off games have to run to 8 ends and so in spite of scoring a 2 at the 7th end hands were shaken at 4-10 after 8.
After a run of three dispiriting losses the team had to re-energise themselves for the bronze medal game against Hungary. Things started badly by losing a steal of 1 at the first end but a 3 in end 2 and a steal of 1 in 3 settled the nerves and the bronze medal was eventually won with an 8-5 scoreline. After 2 bronze medals in 4 years the final 2 years of the team’s participation resulted in 7th and 9th places and after 2016 Alan MacDougall retired from the men’s team.
John Brown (Coach), Ben Fowler, Andrew Woolston, Tom Jaeggi, Andrew Reed, Alan MacDougall
16 - 2015 European Junior Championship, Prague (Women) – Gold
Having debuted in the European Juniors way back in 2009 it was the last chance for Hetty Garnier and Naomi Robinson to make their mark as juniors. Their bronze medal in Lohja the previous year made them determined to go out on an even higher note. With the same teammates as then – Angharad Ward, Lucy Sparks and Niamh Fenton they set off to Prague in early January of 2015 with some old rivals included in a 14 team entry divided into 2 groups of 7.
The team got off to a storming start with a 5 at the first end of their first game against Spain which they went on to win by 14-1. This was followed by equally impressive wins over Slovenia (9-1), Slovakia (8-1) and Poland (5-2). The 5th game was a bit tougher and it needed 2 stolen singles in 7 and 8 to beat Turkey by 4-2. The last round robin then provided the first defeat as they were beaten by Italy by 7-2. Italy however did not progress any further as they had only won 2 other games and so England finished on top of the Group with a quarter final against Latvia on the horizon.
Latvia stole a single in the first end but that was the only time they troubled the scorers as England replied with 7 over the next 6 ends to continue their impressive form and bounce back from the defeat by Italy. The semi-final opponents were Hungary who you may remember beat them the previous year when they ran out of time. This time there were no such issues but, after stealing a 3 in end 4 on the way to a 5-2 lead after 6, they lost a 3 in 7 to go into the last end all square with the hammer. However a well played end saw 1 shot taken for a 6-5 win and they were in the final!
Waiting them there were Turkey who had provided such a stern challenge in the round robin but this time there was much less difficulty. A 3 in the first end followed by Turkey blanking and then taking a single was followed by 6 more shots for England over the next 3 ends and hands were shaken after 6 with the gold medal and a place in the World Championship won by a score of 9-1.
Overall it had been a brilliant performance by the team – they outscored their opponents over the 8 games by 64 shots to 21 and had allowed 5 of the teams just a single shot per game. It was a long way away from Hetty and Naomi’s first appearance in 2009 when the situation had been very much the reverse. So it was off to the World Juniors in Tallinn where they finished with 2 wins but were in no way out of their depth with only 1 of the games (against the USA) finishing with what could be called a bad defeat. To cap it all Niamh Fenton won the Sportsmanship award voted on by all the players.
Sara Jahodova (Coach), Niamh Fenton, Lucy Sparks, Naomi Robinson, Angharad Ward, Hetty Garnier
17 - 2018 European Championship, B Division, Tallinn (Men) – Silver
For the 2018 English Championships Andrew Reed and Tom Jaeggi had joined up with their arch rivals for over 10 years, Michael Opel and Jamie Malton and success came to them when they beat Andrew Woolston and his team twice on the last day of the Championships. With the addition of Gary Tapp as alternate they travelled to Tallinn in Estonia for another European B Division Championship (Andrew’s 13th and Tom’s 11th).
Once again there were 16 entries in 2 groups of 8 and the England team started off against Austria and went down the 10th end at 6-4, but without the hammer and that was a problem which cost them a 3 and an early defeat by 6-7. The next game against Lithuania was going well at 6-1 to us at half time but a 5 for the opposition in the 6th end changed the tenor of the game and it took a 3 in the 9th end to open out the score again and enable us to win 10-7.
Game 3 was a nailbiter against Wales but it was a last stone victory for England by 6-5 and then there were 2 more wins against Belarus (12-5) and Slovenia (10-4) before a disaster of a start against Israel, which saw us 0-7 after just 2 ends, left just too much to do though the score was made respectable at 8-10. The last round robin game was against Denmark, a country who had plummeted from the heights of a silver medal at the World Championships in 2016 all the way down to Division C and were on their way back up.
The Danes were still struggling and had lost twice already to Belarus and Wales but a defeat from them would have eliminated England from the play-offs even through 3 qualified, such was the tightness of the competition at the top of the group. In the end it was a surprisingly easy win for England by 8-2 which left them top of the group and straight through to the semi-finals while Belarus and Denmark had to negotiate quarter-finals.
England’s semi-final was against Latvia who had beaten Belarus in the quarter and after a couple of blank ends we scored a 2 which was immediately cancelled out when they scored 3 at the next end. It was 5-5 after 7 when England then stole a 3 in 8 and that was enough to get them through to the final which would be against Denmark, who had beaten the Czech Republic at another extra end. It also guaranteed not only promotion to Division A of the Europeans but also a place in the new World Championship Qualifying Event which would be held in New Zealand just a few weeks later. After all that excitement the final was a tame affair with Denmark opening up an early lead and then scoring a 4 in the 8th end which led to a 10-4 victory.
In the WQE England finished 2nd out of 8 teams in the round robin before losing to the leaders Korea in a Page Play-off 1 v 2 game and then to the Netherlands in the play-off for 2nd. So no World Champion ship place for England but a return after 14 years to Division A of the Europeans.
Gary Tapp, Tom Jaeggi, Jamie Malton, Michael Opel, Andrew Reed
18 - 2023 European Championship, B Division, Perth (Men) – Gold
So now we are nearly finished!!
After a disappointing 10th place in the A Division in Helsingborg and then 2 mid table finishes in Division B in Lillehammer and Ostersund it was a new team which represented England at the 2023 European B Division held in Perth. For the first time in 14 years neither Andrew Reed nor Andrew Woolston would be playing as they had been defeated in the English Championships by Rob Retchless, Joe Sugden, Jonathan Havercroft and Harry Pinnell. Unfortunately Harry was unable to play in the Europeans and so Scott Gibson (who had been playing with the two Andrews) stepped in to play second while Jonathan moved to lead. Felix Price joined them as alternate / coach.
Although new to the Championship they were not inexperienced and Rob, a Canadian who qualifies for England by having English parentage, brought a different approach to the game backed up by the power and youth of Joe and Scott in the middle of the team and more experience from Jonathan, who also was the vice, at lead.
Unsurprisingly many of the opposition were those we had been playing against for many years, illustrated by the opening game against Juraj Gallo of Slovakia. Having won the hammer for the first end things developed well and England led 7-1 after 6 before a 3 for Slovakia, after a blank, closed things right up after 8. However a single for England led to a handshake after 9.
Next up were Ireland who in 2022 had beaten us with an inch perfect draw by skip John Wilson. It was the same Irish team this year and some great play from them had us hanging on at 3-7 at the break but a good talking-to from coach David Ramsay saw a different team come out and take the second half by 6 shots to 1 and the victory by 9-8.
Compared to that the next game against Spain was a bit more of a stroll with hands being shaken after just 7 ends with England 10-3 up and it was a similarly early finish, surprisingly, against Wales who lost heart a bit after losing 5 at the 6th and we signed off with an 11-2 win. So far, so good and the trend continued with a 10-2 win against Ukraine before it was the turn of Austria, as so often in the past, to turn the tables on us and win by 11-3. Nevertheless England had qualified for the play-offs, it would just be a case of whether it was for the semi-final or the quarter final. A win against relative newcomers Liechtenstein by 11-1 sealed the semi-final spot by finishing top of the group with Austria in 2nd and Spain 3rd.
The semi-final was against France, one of our earliest opponents dating back to 1976 and who held a 13-8 lifetime win-loss record against us. Skipped by Eddie Mercier they are coached by his father Thierry who I had played against in the Europeans 40 years ago. This game was a cagey affair to begin with, the score ticking up to 2-2 after 6 ends. A well played 7th end saw us take a 3 and after a further 2 at the 9th we had won by 7-3. The final awaited and we were back in Division A for 2024. There was no longer a route to get to the World Championship this season and so we must wait to see if we can do that at next year’s Europeans.
And so the final and it was Austria again! As with France we have been playing them for many years and held a 12-8 win-loss record before this game. Another low scoring start and it was 2-2 at half time before Austria went into the lead for the first time by 4-3 after 7. Having been forced into a single at the 8th to be level we then played 2 great ends to steal in both 9 and 10 to win by 6-4 and take the first set of gold medals won by an England men’s team.
Rob Retchless, Jonathan Havercroft, Felix Price (back), Joe Sugden, David Ramsay (Coach)(back), Scott Gibson
So that is it, an extensive and probably overlong review of the various medals won by England’s international teams from the bright start in 1976 through the unsuccessful 1980s and ‘90s to the glut at the beginning of the 2000s and then the 2 golds and one silver of the last 9 years.
I hope you have enjoyed it and for some it will bring back happy memories. Look our for further blogs about the history of English curling and if there is anything you want to see covered then let me know.
10 - 2007 European Championship, B Division, Fussen (Women) – Gold
There were familiar faces in the team that travelled to Fussen in the South of Germany for the 2007 European Championships and at the end of it all the women’s team of Kirsty Balfour, Caroline Reed, Claire Grimwood, Sarah McVey and Joan Reed at last won the gold medals that they had, in various combinations, been close to winning in previous years. It was Kirsty’s first year of skipping at this level and she took over from Joan Reed who moved to alternate, with her daughter, Caroline coming into the team at third.
This year there were 13 teams in the B Division and they were divided into a group of 7 and a group of 6, and England were in the latter. One of the surprises was the presence of Norway in the other group after they had been relegated in 2006 for the first time. Skipped by the great Dordi Nordby, who was playing in her 25th European Championship, they would be the favourites to win the Division and head up back to Division A.
Old rivals, the Netherlands, skipped by Shari Leibbrandt-Demmon were the first opposition and this low-scoring game eventually went to the Dutch by 4-3. With only 5 games to be played and only 2 qualifying every win would be vital and so the next game against Poland was very important, even this early in the competition. A steal of 2 in the 7th end was the crucial point in the game as it gave us an 8-4 lead and the game finished at 9-5.
Three more wins against Slovakia (11-6), Latvia (11-4) and Croatia (11-3) meant that we finished second in the table, but only because the Netherlands had beaten us as they had surprisingly lost to Latvia at an extra end and finished level on 4 wins.
So this gave us a semi-final against Norway who not surprisingly had been undefeated in winning the other group, while the Netherlands faced France in the other semi-final. At this point in time England’s women had played Norway 16 times over the years and the last time they had won had been in 1977 with past defeats including scores of 7-18, 1-14 and 1-15 (twice) and so it was perhaps with a touch of overconfidence that Dordi led her team onto the ice.
What then followed was one of the great moments in English curling history and it is worthwhile looking at the details. Having won the hammer for the first end England blanked but then Norway stole a shot in the second and we then blanked the third before taking 2 in the 4th; Norway scored 1 in the 5th and then stole from us again in the 6th to go 3-2 up. We were forced to take a single in the 7th but then stole in the 8th to go 4-3 up! This was nail-biting stuff and unfortunately I missed it as I had had to go home early from the Championships!! In the 9th end we forced Norway to a single shot and so it was into the last end, all square with the hammer. Sixteen stones later it was all over and England had won by 5 shots to 4 for a famous and outstanding victory and promotion back up to the A Division. It was also the last appearance by Dordi Nordby in International competition as the Norwegians did not turn up for the bronze-medal game against France.
Of course there was still a final to be played and now the aim was not only to win the final and the gold medals but also, by doing so, it would give us a crack at getting to the World Championships via play-off games against the Czech Republic who had finished 8th in Division A. The final was against the Netherlands who had been the only team to beat us all week and this started off with neither team willing to go on the offensive so that the score after 5 ends was just 2-1 for England.
However a big steal of 3 for England in the 6th end seemed to have turned the game in their favour but the Dutch came back strongly so that going into the last end it was all square at 6-6 with England having the hammer. Once again, as in the semi against Norway, supporters’ nerves were on edge but on the ice a score of 2 was enough to win the first set of gold medals for England at any level.
Unfortunately the World Championships proved out of reach as the Czech Republic won the right to go by beating us 9-7 and 11-6.
Claire Grimwood, Caroline Reed, Kirsty Balfour, Joan Reed, Sarah McVey
I have spent quite a while describing this competition as it really was a highlight for English curling up to that time, not just the fact that the gold medals had been won but also the manner in which they had been won by winning two close games at the tenth end against 2 very good teams.
From this point the women spent two years in the A Division before returning to the B in 2010.
11 - 2009 European Mixed Championship, Prague – Bronze
The next set of medals for England came in the recently established European Mixed Championship. This was begun in 2005 as a much more social competition than the high-pressure European Men’s and Women’s Championships though it quickly developed into a major event in its own right with the majority of the European Member Associations participating.
Alan Macdougall had been our representative ever since the first year (though we had not entered in 2006) and he was joined in 2009 by Lana Watson, Andrew Reed and Suzie Law. The same team had finished 11th in 2007 and 10th in 2008 (when John Sharp replaced Andrew Reed).
The 24 teams were divided into 3 groups of 8 and by the end of the round-robin England sat on top of the Yellow Group, undefeated after wins over Russia (3-2 after extra end), Sweden (7-4), Austria (5-4 after extra end), Ireland (8-1), Italy (9-3), Norway (8-2) and Serbia (22-0). This led to a semi-final against a Danish team who had been runners-up to the surprise Welsh winners in 2007.
Denmark had the hammer in the first end which they blanked and then they took 2 in the second end. Singles were exchanged in 3 and 4 and England blanked 5 and 6 before being forced to take their one in the 7th end to leave the score at 3-2 for Denmark who scored 1 with the hammer to progress to the final while England faced the Czech Republic for the bronze. Another close game with no score greater than one in any end, but 3 steals helped England to a 5-1 lead after 6 before they lost the 7th and the 8th to win the bronze medals by 5-3.
The same team returned for the 2010 edition at Greenacres where they finished 4th after losing play-off games to Switzerland and Germany.
Alan MacDougall, Lana Watson, Andrew Reed, Suzie Law
12 - 2011 European Championship, B Division, Moscow (Men) – Bronze
By the time the teams rolled into Moscow for the European Championships in 2011 it had been 7 years since England’s men had last won medals and in that time they had seen the women win 2 bronzes and a gold. In 2010 Alan MacDougall, Andrew Reed, Andrew Woolston and Tom Jaeggi began a run of 7 consecutive appearances at the European Championships with a disappointing 3-4 record on poor ice at Champery. For Moscow they had invited John Brown along as coach / alternate.
Owing to the increasing number of nations participating in the B Division the WCF had introduced a C Division in 2010 and had restricted the number of men’s teams in the B Division to 16, divided into 2 groups of 8. So now, as well as trying to gain promotion to the A Division, teams also had to try and avoid relegation to the C Division.
This hurdle was easily overcome by England as they finished second in their group behind Ireland who had beaten them 8-1, but this was set against wins over Estonia (7-6 after extra end), Poland (9-2), Belgium (8-4), Wales (9-6), Netherlands (5-4) and Croatia (9-1). A Page play-off system was being used and this meant that England faced Russia who had finished 2nd in the other group and unfortunately the game was lost by 6-2 and this put us into a bronze medal game against Ireland who had lost play-offs against Hungary and Russia. In a reverse of the earlier game England won this by 8-4 and Alan and Andrew added European men’s bronzes to the Mixed ones they had won 2 years before.
Tom Jaeggi, Andrew Woolston, Alan MacDougall, John Brown, Andrew Reed
13 - 2013 European Championship, B Division, Stavanger (Women) – Bronze
After the 2007 gold medals there had been a fallow period for the England women in the A Division, and then for a few years in the B Division, as the golden team gradually retired, but by the time the 2013 European Championships in Stavanger came around a new generation of young women curlers had come up through the junior programme at Fenton’s Rink.
Anna Fowler had experienced her first European Championships in Moscow in 2011 under the leadership of the experienced Fiona Hawker who you may remember first won bronze with Joan Reed back in 2000 and then silver in 2002. Now Anna had joined with her junior team mates, Hetty Garnier, Naomi Robinson, Lauren Pearce and Lucy Sparks
Since the C Division had been introduced the B Division for women was limited to 10 teams which meant a substantial programme of 9 round robin games to be negotiated. It started promisingly with three wins against Slovenia (15-3), Belarus (10-4) and Poland (7-5) but then Turkey struck the first dent in the armour with a 7-4 win. Two more hard fought wins followed against Austria (8-7) and Spain (7-5) before another hiccup with defeats by Hungary (4-6) and Estonia (6-7) left them on a 5-3 record and needing to win their last game against Finland.
The Finns had been relegated the previous year and had lost just 1 game so far against Estonia, who were to finish top of the standings, so it was not going to be easy. England got off to a flying start with a couple of 2s and maintained a lead at half time of 6-2 which they stretched a little before being pegged back to 9-7 going down the last with hammer, from which they took a 1 and a 10-7 victory.
This left them in third after the round robin and the Page 3 / 4 game against Austria was next up. This was a high scoring game which hung in the balance with Austria leading 7-6 after 7 before a pair of 3s gave England a 12-7 win. This then led to a semi-final against Estonia which was lost 2-7 and therefore it was back to another game against Austria for the bronze medal. It was a game where England were always ahead after the second end and they held on to beat the Austrians for the third time in a week, this time by 7-5.
This was to be the last set of medals won by the women’s team to date though there have been 4th places in 2015 (lost to Latvia), 2019 (lost to Hungary) and 2021 (lost to Hungary again).
John Sharp (Coach), Lucy Sparks, Lauren Pearce, Naomi Robinson, Hetty Garnier, Anna Fowler
14 - 2014 European Junior Championship, Lohja (Women) – Bronze
Just a few weeks after winning bronze medals at the European B Championship as described above, Hetty Garnier, Naomi Robinson and Lucy Sparks were off to the European Junior Championships in Finland where they were joined by Angharad Ward and Niamh Fenton. This was the 6th European Juniors for Hetty and Naomi and they still had one more to come.
The 12 teams were split into 2 groups of 7 and England got off to a bad start in their first game when they failed to finish the game in their allotted time while 4-6 down to Hungary – an important lesson learnt. After that however, the other 5 games resulted in victories against Germany (4-3), Latvia (7-2), Estonia (5-4), Finland (13-0) and Norway (8-2) which left them 2nd in group behind Hungary and with a semi-final against Italy to come. Unfortunately the Italians were too strong on this occasion racing into a 7-0 lead by half time and eventually winning by 9-2.
This left just the bronze medal game against Poland and things did not look too good at 4-6 after 6 ends but a run of singles in 7, 8 and an extra end saw them squeeze through by 7-6 and the first medals for one of our junior teams.
Lucy Sparks, Naomi Robinson, Hetty Garnier, Angharad Ward, Niamh Fenton (photo is from 2013 in Prague).
15 - 2014 European Championship, B Division, Champery (Men) – Bronze
It was a quick return to Champery for Alan MacDougall, Andrew Reed, Andrew Woolston and Tom Jaeggi who were joined on this occasion by our junior skip Ben Fowler at alternate. The two years since Moscow had seen a 4th place in Karlstad (lost to Netherlands) and an 8th in Stavanger and the team travelled to Switzerland hoping that the ice in the Monthey arena was going to be better than 4 years previously.
As normal the B Division was divided into 2 groups of 8 but France withdrew at the last minute and so England were left in a group of 7 instead. The first game was against Lithuania who we had never lost to and the run continued with a 7-3 win. Four more close wins followed against Netherlands (7-5), Croatia (7-6), Turkey (6-5) and Estonia (7-5) meaning that we were guaranteed to finish top of the group. The final game was our first ever against Israel and with Alan MacDougall resting on the bench the team lost a game they had never been in charge of by 6-7.
The Page 1 / 2 game was against Finland and although we held them to 2-3 at half time they ran away to win by 8-2 after 9 ends. So a semi-final was next against Netherlands and this was over by the 5th end when a 6 was lost and we were down by 2-9. The 6th end was blanked but unfortunately play-off games have to run to 8 ends and so in spite of scoring a 2 at the 7th end hands were shaken at 4-10 after 8.
After a run of three dispiriting losses the team had to re-energise themselves for the bronze medal game against Hungary. Things started badly by losing a steal of 1 at the first end but a 3 in end 2 and a steal of 1 in 3 settled the nerves and the bronze medal was eventually won with an 8-5 scoreline. After 2 bronze medals in 4 years the final 2 years of the team’s participation resulted in 7th and 9th places and after 2016 Alan MacDougall retired from the men’s team.
John Brown (Coach), Ben Fowler, Andrew Woolston, Tom Jaeggi, Andrew Reed, Alan MacDougall
16 - 2015 European Junior Championship, Prague (Women) – Gold
Having debuted in the European Juniors way back in 2009 it was the last chance for Hetty Garnier and Naomi Robinson to make their mark as juniors. Their bronze medal in Lohja the previous year made them determined to go out on an even higher note. With the same teammates as then – Angharad Ward, Lucy Sparks and Niamh Fenton they set off to Prague in early January of 2015 with some old rivals included in a 14 team entry divided into 2 groups of 7.
The team got off to a storming start with a 5 at the first end of their first game against Spain which they went on to win by 14-1. This was followed by equally impressive wins over Slovenia (9-1), Slovakia (8-1) and Poland (5-2). The 5th game was a bit tougher and it needed 2 stolen singles in 7 and 8 to beat Turkey by 4-2. The last round robin then provided the first defeat as they were beaten by Italy by 7-2. Italy however did not progress any further as they had only won 2 other games and so England finished on top of the Group with a quarter final against Latvia on the horizon.
Latvia stole a single in the first end but that was the only time they troubled the scorers as England replied with 7 over the next 6 ends to continue their impressive form and bounce back from the defeat by Italy. The semi-final opponents were Hungary who you may remember beat them the previous year when they ran out of time. This time there were no such issues but, after stealing a 3 in end 4 on the way to a 5-2 lead after 6, they lost a 3 in 7 to go into the last end all square with the hammer. However a well played end saw 1 shot taken for a 6-5 win and they were in the final!
Waiting them there were Turkey who had provided such a stern challenge in the round robin but this time there was much less difficulty. A 3 in the first end followed by Turkey blanking and then taking a single was followed by 6 more shots for England over the next 3 ends and hands were shaken after 6 with the gold medal and a place in the World Championship won by a score of 9-1.
Overall it had been a brilliant performance by the team – they outscored their opponents over the 8 games by 64 shots to 21 and had allowed 5 of the teams just a single shot per game. It was a long way away from Hetty and Naomi’s first appearance in 2009 when the situation had been very much the reverse. So it was off to the World Juniors in Tallinn where they finished with 2 wins but were in no way out of their depth with only 1 of the games (against the USA) finishing with what could be called a bad defeat. To cap it all Niamh Fenton won the Sportsmanship award voted on by all the players.
Sara Jahodova (Coach), Niamh Fenton, Lucy Sparks, Naomi Robinson, Angharad Ward, Hetty Garnier
17 - 2018 European Championship, B Division, Tallinn (Men) – Silver
For the 2018 English Championships Andrew Reed and Tom Jaeggi had joined up with their arch rivals for over 10 years, Michael Opel and Jamie Malton and success came to them when they beat Andrew Woolston and his team twice on the last day of the Championships. With the addition of Gary Tapp as alternate they travelled to Tallinn in Estonia for another European B Division Championship (Andrew’s 13th and Tom’s 11th).
Once again there were 16 entries in 2 groups of 8 and the England team started off against Austria and went down the 10th end at 6-4, but without the hammer and that was a problem which cost them a 3 and an early defeat by 6-7. The next game against Lithuania was going well at 6-1 to us at half time but a 5 for the opposition in the 6th end changed the tenor of the game and it took a 3 in the 9th end to open out the score again and enable us to win 10-7.
Game 3 was a nailbiter against Wales but it was a last stone victory for England by 6-5 and then there were 2 more wins against Belarus (12-5) and Slovenia (10-4) before a disaster of a start against Israel, which saw us 0-7 after just 2 ends, left just too much to do though the score was made respectable at 8-10. The last round robin game was against Denmark, a country who had plummeted from the heights of a silver medal at the World Championships in 2016 all the way down to Division C and were on their way back up.
The Danes were still struggling and had lost twice already to Belarus and Wales but a defeat from them would have eliminated England from the play-offs even through 3 qualified, such was the tightness of the competition at the top of the group. In the end it was a surprisingly easy win for England by 8-2 which left them top of the group and straight through to the semi-finals while Belarus and Denmark had to negotiate quarter-finals.
England’s semi-final was against Latvia who had beaten Belarus in the quarter and after a couple of blank ends we scored a 2 which was immediately cancelled out when they scored 3 at the next end. It was 5-5 after 7 when England then stole a 3 in 8 and that was enough to get them through to the final which would be against Denmark, who had beaten the Czech Republic at another extra end. It also guaranteed not only promotion to Division A of the Europeans but also a place in the new World Championship Qualifying Event which would be held in New Zealand just a few weeks later. After all that excitement the final was a tame affair with Denmark opening up an early lead and then scoring a 4 in the 8th end which led to a 10-4 victory.
In the WQE England finished 2nd out of 8 teams in the round robin before losing to the leaders Korea in a Page Play-off 1 v 2 game and then to the Netherlands in the play-off for 2nd. So no World Champion ship place for England but a return after 14 years to Division A of the Europeans.
Gary Tapp, Tom Jaeggi, Jamie Malton, Michael Opel, Andrew Reed
18 - 2023 European Championship, B Division, Perth (Men) – Gold
So now we are nearly finished!!
After a disappointing 10th place in the A Division in Helsingborg and then 2 mid table finishes in Division B in Lillehammer and Ostersund it was a new team which represented England at the 2023 European B Division held in Perth. For the first time in 14 years neither Andrew Reed nor Andrew Woolston would be playing as they had been defeated in the English Championships by Rob Retchless, Joe Sugden, Jonathan Havercroft and Harry Pinnell. Unfortunately Harry was unable to play in the Europeans and so Scott Gibson (who had been playing with the two Andrews) stepped in to play second while Jonathan moved to lead. Felix Price joined them as alternate / coach.
Although new to the Championship they were not inexperienced and Rob, a Canadian who qualifies for England by having English parentage, brought a different approach to the game backed up by the power and youth of Joe and Scott in the middle of the team and more experience from Jonathan, who also was the vice, at lead.
Unsurprisingly many of the opposition were those we had been playing against for many years, illustrated by the opening game against Juraj Gallo of Slovakia. Having won the hammer for the first end things developed well and England led 7-1 after 6 before a 3 for Slovakia, after a blank, closed things right up after 8. However a single for England led to a handshake after 9.
Next up were Ireland who in 2022 had beaten us with an inch perfect draw by skip John Wilson. It was the same Irish team this year and some great play from them had us hanging on at 3-7 at the break but a good talking-to from coach David Ramsay saw a different team come out and take the second half by 6 shots to 1 and the victory by 9-8.
Compared to that the next game against Spain was a bit more of a stroll with hands being shaken after just 7 ends with England 10-3 up and it was a similarly early finish, surprisingly, against Wales who lost heart a bit after losing 5 at the 6th and we signed off with an 11-2 win. So far, so good and the trend continued with a 10-2 win against Ukraine before it was the turn of Austria, as so often in the past, to turn the tables on us and win by 11-3. Nevertheless England had qualified for the play-offs, it would just be a case of whether it was for the semi-final or the quarter final. A win against relative newcomers Liechtenstein by 11-1 sealed the semi-final spot by finishing top of the group with Austria in 2nd and Spain 3rd.
The semi-final was against France, one of our earliest opponents dating back to 1976 and who held a 13-8 lifetime win-loss record against us. Skipped by Eddie Mercier they are coached by his father Thierry who I had played against in the Europeans 40 years ago. This game was a cagey affair to begin with, the score ticking up to 2-2 after 6 ends. A well played 7th end saw us take a 3 and after a further 2 at the 9th we had won by 7-3. The final awaited and we were back in Division A for 2024. There was no longer a route to get to the World Championship this season and so we must wait to see if we can do that at next year’s Europeans.
And so the final and it was Austria again! As with France we have been playing them for many years and held a 12-8 win-loss record before this game. Another low scoring start and it was 2-2 at half time before Austria went into the lead for the first time by 4-3 after 7. Having been forced into a single at the 8th to be level we then played 2 great ends to steal in both 9 and 10 to win by 6-4 and take the first set of gold medals won by an England men’s team.
Rob Retchless, Jonathan Havercroft, Felix Price (back), Joe Sugden, David Ramsay (Coach)(back), Scott Gibson
So that is it, an extensive and probably overlong review of the various medals won by England’s international teams from the bright start in 1976 through the unsuccessful 1980s and ‘90s to the glut at the beginning of the 2000s and then the 2 golds and one silver of the last 9 years.
I hope you have enjoyed it and for some it will bring back happy memories. Look our for further blogs about the history of English curling and if there is anything you want to see covered then let me know.
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