Butterfield and Kean ready to bounce back against Latvia

Jo Butterfield and Jason Kean have the opportunity to make an immediate return to form following a disappointing defeat to South Korea in the mixed doubles wheelchair curling.

They fell to 14-3 defeat to Hyejin Baek and Yongsuk Lee in the second round robin match, having also lost to Estonia in their opener on Wednesday.

But a clash against Latvia on Thursday evening, who have also lost both their opening round robin fixtures, represents the perfect opportunity to return to form.

“It’s a difficult result. It’s not the way we wanted to start our campaign. Two losses is not what we came here to do,” reflected Butterfield.

“But that one, in particular, is going to take a little bit of getting over. We’ve got to bounce back quick tonight, so we’ll have a chat about it in the changing room with the coaches and work out the things we did well and things we didn’t do well.

“Losing a five in the fifth end was always going to be an uphill battle. We tried our best and we came back pretty strong, but we unfortunately messed it up at the end.

“We’ll iron it out and come back stronger tonight.”

Butterfield and Kean got off to a better start than their opener against Estonia as they took the first end 1-0.

A three-score return from South Korea put the Brits on the back foot, but they continued to score steadily to trail by just one at 3-2 heading into the fourth end.

But the Brits struggled to make the Koreans pay when they did make mistakes.

“It was a case of when we had opportunities, but we didn’t capitalise on them,” said Kean.

“There were opportunities to get a four back, there were opportunities in the third end to get a decent score, as well.

“But a few mistakes here and there and we weren’t able to capitalise on it. We will go back to the coaches, have a chat and work out what went right and what went wrong.

“We’ve got a good idea of what went wrong. Shot making at the end of the day and when you’re giving your opposition the opportunity to score a big end like a five or a three, if you can minimise them then you’re definitely in a better position.”

Lee and Baek were sublime on the ice, and it showed as they took a five-score end in the fourth, putting them 8-2 ahead at the break.

It was a deficit that Butterfield and Kean would struggle to recover from. Despite taking another 1-0 win in the sixth end, another high-scoring end in the seventh from Korea would leave the Great Britain team unable to find a way back.

It represented a heavy defeat for the duo in the second match, having had to settle for a 10-7 defeat to World Championship bronze medallists Estonia in their opener.

But if any pair have been able to take the lessons of their past defeats, its Butterfield and Kean.

“Yesterday we had a really lazy first half and then we came back strong and it wasn’t quite enough in the end,” reflected Butterfield.

“Whereas today we said let’s go out and start strong, and we did. We outplayed them in that first end and then we probably got a little bit greedy which cost us a little bit.

“They bounced back really well, and I think that’s something we need to learn. They played a couple of bad ends but straight away they bounced back with a big score in the next end which shows something about resilience.”