Bruce Mouat channelling storied spirit of Rhona Martin after booking date with Winter Olympic curling destiny

Rhona Martin was the first to hug Bruce Mouat and his history boys after they secured at least Olympic silver and a shot at emulating the Stone of Destiny.

Curling fate is knocking at the door of Mouat, Grant Hardie, Bobby Lammie and Hammy McMillan and now it comes against Sweden in Saturday’s gold medal match.

A topsy-turvy 8-4 triumph over USA guaranteed Team GB a medal and ensured, 90 hours before the end of the Games, that Britain won’t come home from Beijing empty-handed.

But these four want more - the chance to turn Britain’s fifth Olympic curling medal into a first gold since Martin's magical moment in 2002.

“We have the chance to emulate Rhona and that’s such a big moment for curling back home,” said an emotional Mouat.

“We really want to be able to replicate something like that. If we go out and play the game we've played all of this week, we'll be close to being able to have a moment like that.”

The Scots secured Britain’s first curling medal since silver at Sochi 2014 - won by David Murdoch, who watched on proudly from the bench as head coach.

It was the eighth successive victory of an outstanding debut Olympics for the quartet.

“It's something we dreamed of back when we put the team together in 2017,” said McMillan. “This is what we wanted out of the four years. To be in the final and have a chance of winning a gold is everything we worked for.”

The early exchanges of the semi-final were frenetic and high-scoring as Britain scored three in the third end, either side of scores of two from USA veteran John Shuster.

Mouat’s men led 5-4 at the halfway stage and the dynamic of the game totally changed after the break with the next three ends all blanked.

Two sloppy shots from American third Chris Plys reopened