Mouat is on mission to reach gold standard in Denmark

Murrayfield curler Bruce Mouat begins his bid to become the first Scottish winner since Kyle Smith in 2013 when he plays his opening round robin match at the World Junior Championships in Taarnby, near Copenhagen on Sunday.

Bruce Mouat

The Napier student took bronze in Tallinn last March, and although Canadian champion Braden Calvert is not defending his title in Denmark, Swiss runner-up Yannick Schwaller has returned and will be one of Mouat’s biggest threats in the hunt for gold.

The 21-year-old Scot and his team-mates Angus Dowell, Gregor Cannon and Bobby Lammie meet Norway’s Magnus Ramsfjell first, and Mouat expects the standard to be sky-high in Copenhagen.

“Canada and Switzerland are pretty strong, and Sweden and USA also have really good teams, so it’s probably a harder field than it was last year,” he predicted.

“The guys and I are really looking forward to representing Scotland again, and we’re going to use the experience we gained from last year to try and improve on the bronze medal we got then.

“We really want to do better than that this time.”

Dumfries skip Sophie Jackson aims to continue a fine Scottish tradition in the girls’ competition after four titles for Perth’s Eve Muirhead and a silver medal last year for Edinburgh’s Gina Aitken.