Winter Paralympics: Britain’s wheelchair footballers lose opening mixed doubles match to Estonia

Great Britain suffered disappointment after a 10-7 defeat by Estonia in the opening wheelchair curling match at the Milan-Cortina Winter Paralympics.

British pair Joe Butterfield and Jason Kane had trailed the world bronze medalists 5-2 after four of the eight finishes in the inaugural mixed doubles tournament, but they pulled two back in the fifth end and scored three goals in a brilliant sixth to put them back in contention.

Estonia led 8-7 going into the final over and although Team GB had the hammer advantage going into the final, they needed a double knockdown but failed to give their opponents the win.

This is the first time that competitions will be held at the Games before the opening ceremony, which will be held on Friday.

It has fallen to Butterfield, who is aiming to become the first Briton to win gold medals at the Summer and Winter Paralympics, and Keane to be the first member of a British Paralympic team to begin his Games campaign.

The Estonia side of Katelin Redbach and Ein Velau took advantage of the hammer in the opening finale to score twice but GB responded to equalize after two goals, but they could only have scored three goals by narrowly missing out.

However, the Estonians began to take control of the third period, as the Britons had to work hard to reduce their opponents to just two teams, and thanks to a powerful shot at the last end before half-time, Estonia took a 5-2 lead.

But GB started the second half of the game strongly and used the hammer to make it 5-4 before an error from Riidebach and a loaded stone from Butterfield left them in front for the first time in the game.

Estonia’s strong seventh finish allowed them to creep forward again, and in a tense climax they did some good work to get two stones home at the end that Team GB couldn’t handle.

The British team will continue its program against South Korea, which lost its opening match 7-5 to host Italy, on Thursday at 09:05 GMT, before facing Latvia at 18:05.

Latvia was defeated 11-6 by the United States in the opening match, while China easily beat Japan 10-3 in the other match today.