Off to the Con Cup

David Murdoch, Ewan MacDonald and Euan Byers have had just one day at home after their successful Le Gruyere European Championship. Today (Tuesday) they set off to play in the Continental Cup which begins on Thursday in Camrose, Alberta. Murdoch will play for Team World - the opposition for the North American sides will include China's Bingyu Wang, the 2008 Ford World Women's silver medallist, and Fengchun Wang, fourth place finisher at the 2008 World men's, both of whom also won the recent Pacific Championships.

But who is Murdoch's fourth player? As none of the GB Squad, or Graeme Connal, are able to travel to Canada, Sweden's Niklas Edin has been brought in, just like last year (see here).

This year's Continental Cup will be played in the 2,300-seat EnCana Arena at the Edgeworth Centre, bringing together many of the world's finest curlers in the Ryder Cup-like event, which provides each member of the winning team with $2,000, while each losing team member gets $1,400.

Team World is strong. It includes all four finalists at the Le Gruyère European Championships in Örnsköldsvik as well as the Chinese.

The games start with the Women's team games on Thursday. Find the results online here.
The team lists for the 2008 Continental Cup, which is presented by Monsanto, are:

TEAM WORLD - Captain: Pål Trulsen, Coach: Peja Lindholm
Bingyu Wang, Yin Liu, Qingshuang Yue, Yan Zhou
Anette Norberg, Kajsa Bergström (replaces Eva Lund), Cathrine Lindahl, Anna Svärd
Mirjam Ott, Carmen Schäfer, Valeria Spälty, Janine Greiner

Fengchun Wang, Rui Liu, Xiaoming Xu, Jialiang Zang
Thomas Ulsrud, Torger Nergård, Christoffer Svae, Håvard Vad Petersson
David Murdoch, Ewan MacDonald, Niklas Edin, Euan Byers

TEAM NORTH AMERICA - Captain: Russ Howard, Coach: Jim Waite
Jennifer Jones, Cathy Overton-Clapham, Jill Officer, Dawn Askin
Stefanie Lawton, Marliese Kasner, Teejay Surik (replaces Sherri Singler), Lana Vey
Debbie McCormick, Allison Pottinger, Nicole Joraanstad, Tracy Sachtjen (replaces Natalie Nicholson)

Kevin Koe (third stones), Blake MacDonald (fourth stones), Carter Rycroft, Nolan Thiessen
Kevin Martin, John Morris, Marc Kennedy, Ben Hebert
Craig Brown, Rich Ruohonen, John Dunlop, Peter Annis

Niklas Edin pic by Bob from the recent Edinburgh International.

Con Cup for Sin City?

I'm pretty sure that the Continental Cup, being played this weekend in Medicine Hat, Alberta, is of little interest to Scottish curlers. Despite the fact that two Scottish teams, skipped by Kelly Wood and David Murdoch are competing for Team Europe, the event has little relevance here, or to other countries in Europe. The made-for-television event, promoted by the World Curling Federation and the Canadian Curling Association, cannot be seen on this side of the Atlantic. Well, that's not strictly so, as some games are available if you are a CurlTV subscriber... and are prepared to sit up to the early hours of the morning.

Does it do anything to promote or advance curling in Europe? I submit it does not.

It's a pity really. By all accounts the players enjoy the event. It benefits them financially and it sounds fun to be part of. But perhaps it is only the logical people of Scotland/Europe that find it a bit strange that the competitors play away for three days, meaninglessly, because the outcome is decided entirely on the last couple of skins games!

Now what stimulated this little rant (and the editorial for January's Scottish Curler having already been written), is the discovery of Al Cameron's interview with Warren Hansen, the CCA's Manager of Event Operations and Media, which can be found here, and is mirrored above. Cameron is the curling scribe for the Calgary Herald. His Cameron on the Rocks blog is here.

Hansen indicates that the Con Cup could be headed for Las Vegas, Nevada, in the years ahead. And if you listen carefully, Hansen sees it coming to Scotland. Aye, right! I personally would hope that the Royal Club has more sense than to waste time and money getting involved in this charade. Speak your mind on the Scottish Curling Forum.

Next year's Con Cup will be held in Alberta, again, at Camrose. The press release is here.

However, if you ARE interested in this years event, you can find all the results here. Team Europe is struggling this time round, as I pen this. Still, Europe stuffed North America last year so it's the latter's turn to win. But does anyone really care?