Curling: Heartbreak as Team GB denied gold again after Canada clinch 9-6 win in Cortina
The men's curling final in Cortina ended in fresh despair for Team GB as Canada beat Bruce Mouat's rink 9-6, denying Britain a men's Olympic gold and leaving the squad with a second successive Olympic silver. The loss preserves a 102-year wait for a men's Olympic curling gold and follows an intense fortnight in Italy in which the Scottish quartet arrived as world champions and favourites but saw their mission fall short.
Curling final: How the game unfolded
Canada entered the match having finished the round-robin ahead of Team GB and therefore had the hammer for the first end. Britain limited Canada to one in that opening end and then scored two in the second to take the early lead. Canada regrouped in the third to lead 3-2, but Britain clawed back to level after four ends.
At the halfway point the Canadians had held the hammer three times but led only 4-3 after a fifth-end miss from Brad Jacobs, who failed to blank the end to retain the hammer. Mouat then executed a double takeout in the sixth to score two and put Great Britain 5-4 up. Canada levelled at 5-5 after the seventh, but an eighth end in which Britain missed shots left them with a single score and a slender 6-5 advantage going into the penultimate end.
With Canada holding the hammer in the ninth and a four on offer, they took three to go 8-6 ahead. Britain had the hammer in the 10th end; Mouat produced a spinning stone with his second-to-last throw that knocked away two Canadian stones, but Canada answered and sealed a 9-6 victory.
Team GB roster, form and expectations
Mouat's rink — Bruce Mouat, Grant Hardie, Hammy McMillan and Bobby Lammie, with alternate Kyle Waddell — arrived in Cortina as world champions and as favourites. They came believing this was their time, having won two World Championships and a pair of European crowns since the last Games, and having accumulated what has been described as an impressive haul of Grand Slam titles in recent seasons. One account cited a record 12 Grand Slam titles since the last Olympics; another reflected a tally of four grand slam events over the past four years.
Patterns and painful history
This defeat repeats a familiar Olympic pattern: Team GB were runners-up at the previous Winter Games in Beijing after losing the final to Sweden, and they leave Cortina with silver for a second successive Olympics. The squad have dominated international curling in many respects, but Olympic gold in the men's event has eluded them for more than a century — a 102-year drought that the team had aimed to end.
Bruce Mouat has now played in four Olympic medal matches across mixed doubles and men's events at two Games and has been on the losing side each time. The emotional toll showed: players were visibly upset after the final, with Grant Hardie describing himself as heartbroken and Hammy McMillan saying it would take him longer to recover this time than after the previous silver.
Rivalry with Canada and match context
The rivalry with Canada has been a recurring subplot. Team GB boast a strong record against Canada and beat them in last year's world semifinals, but Canada — led by an experienced Brad Jacobs team — had beaten Britain in the round-robin earlier in the week, a rare reverse for Mouat's side. Mouat and Jacobs have met many times; the two skips have played each other 14 times, and this final represented only the second time Jacobs has prevailed in that pairing.
Canada's own week in Cortina was described as tumultuous, with off-ice controversy present during the event. The gold medal match was the second time in five days that Canada beat Britain in Cortina.
Road to the final and immediate aftermath
The past 10 days in Italy were far from straightforward for Mouat's rink. They were on the brink of a shock early exit as recently as Thursday, but recovered to guarantee a medal after an epic semi-final win over Switzerland on Thursday — a victory Mouat described in the heat of the moment as essentially their gold medal. That rollercoaster left the team emotionally charged but ultimately short of their stated objective.
After the final, Mouat was visibly emotional and said he felt shocked, noting that the team had believed they were the better side on the day. Grant Hardie reflected on the lingering pain from the previous Olympic final and the missed opportunity to redeem that history. Mouat said he intends to continue to the next Olympic cycle in France and expressed a desire to keep playing, while noting that it was unclear in the provided context whether his three teammates would join him.
What this means for Team GB and the Games
For the British delegation this result represented a fourth medal at these Games that might have been gold instead of silver, and the defeat will prompt immediate reflection on selection, squad futures and the emotional recovery of players. The Cortina Ice Arena crowd — including travelling Scottish supporters who brought bagpipes and bespoke chants — witnessed a tense finale that added another layer to a career-long narrative for Mouat, Hardie, McMillan and Lammie: excellence on the world stage, matched by recurring Olympic heartbreak.
