Italy and Germany have secured their Member Associations places at the 20-team World Mixed Doubles Curling Championship 2020.
Kelowna, British Columbia, Canada, will host the world championship from 18 to 25 April.
Italy and Germany guaranteed their berths, by winning two play-off games, on Friday (6 December) at the World Mixed Doubles Qualification Event 2019. Greenacres Curling Club, near Howwood, in Scotland, is hosting this new event.
With one more day of play to go, there are still two more world championship berths available.
Germany first posted a 13-6 victory over Latvia on Friday morning, before going on to beat Turkey, 7-5, in the afternoon. Italy first beat France 11-4, then went on to edge past Korea, 6-4, to qualify for the world championship.
Second chances
This event has a double knock-out system, therefore, because Korea and Turkey, won their first play-off games, on Friday morning, they now have a second chance to qualify. Korea beat China 6-4 and Turkey defeated Austria 8-6.
A second opportunity to qualify for the world championship was also afforded to the four teams that lost the first play-off round. The four losers of that first round were drawn against one of the other losers in the second play-off round. The winners of those games then progressed to the third round of play-offs – to be played on Saturday.
Austria, beat Latvia, 6-3, in their second-chance game, while China defeated France 11-3, in theirs. This now means that Korea face Austria and Turkey play China on Saturday morning, at 10:00 (Universal Coordinated Time). The winners of those games earn qualification to the World Mixed Doubles Curling Championship 2020.
The format for the double knock-out play-offs can be seen here.
Italy and Germany join, Sweden, Canada, United States, Australia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Japan, Russia, England, Spain, Finland, Hungary, Norway, New Zealand, Scotland and Switzerland, at the world championship in Canada.
Live scores from the World Mixed Doubles Qualification Event 2019 are published here.
You can follow the World Mixed Doubles Qualification Event 2019 and the World Curling Federation on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and Weibo and by searching the hashtag #curling #WMDQE2019
