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Great Britain left it late to achieve medal success at the Winter Olympics but finally secured gold in the Women’s Curling, a few hours after the men’s team had to settle for silver before the closing ceremony in Beijing.
The women’s team, led by curling veteran Eve Muirhead, won comfortably 10-3 against Japan in the final. The victory was sweet revenge for Muirhead in particular as she lost out in the bronze medal final four years ago to the same opposition. The gold medal adds to the bronze the Scot won back in 2014 in Sochi when she became the youngest ever captain to win an Olympic medal in curling.
After the match, Muirhead praised her fellow Scottish teammates Vicky Wright, Jennifer Dodds, Hailey Duff and alternate Mili Smith and was visibly emotional on reflecting on the size of the team’s achievement.
“This is a moment I dreamed of as a young child. Having lost two semi-finals then coming through that great battle against Sweden (in the close-fought semi final at the end of last week), we knew this was an opportunity we might never get again.”
The all Scottish men’s team narrowly missed out on making it double gold as they lost out 5-4 to Sweden after sudden-death.
The men’s skipper Bruce Mouat had mixed emotions after the match.
“I do feel pretty proud of myself and I’m proud of my guys as well. I’m just still a bit raw but I’m sure down the line I’ll feel pretty good about this medal.”
It was a long day for friends and families of both men’s and women’s teams as they gathered at events in Stranraer and Edinburgh, where many of the athletes are from, to watch the men’s final which started at 7am UK time and the women’s final which started at 1am the same evening.
However, it was well worth the early and late starts for the fans who celebrated the success claiming “Curling’s coming home”, given the origins of the sport date back to the 16th century in Scotland.
Despite the success on the final weekend, however, Team GB came up short against their pre-tournament target of three to seven medals and achieved less than half of the five medals they won at the previous Winter Olympics in South Korea four years ago as well as the four medals they won eight years ago in Sochi. They finished 19th in the medal table, a long way off from table-toppers Norway with 37 medals including 16 Gold.
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