Triumphant Olympic curling teams land in Edinburgh

Team GB’s only Olympic medallists received a hero’s welcome after they arrived home to Scotland on Tuesday.

Winter Olympic champion Eve Muirhead and her gold medal-winning teammates arrived back in the capital just days after clinching the top prize in women’s curling when they crushed Japan 10-3.

Muirhead – along with Vicky Wright, Hailey Duff, Jen Dodds and Mili Smith – secured Team GB’s only gold at the Beijing games.

Speaking at Edinburgh Airport during the final leg of her journey back to Stirling, the 31-year-old said she hoped the victory would leave a lasting legacy just like Rhona Martin’s famous 2002 gold in Salt Lake City.

“For us to repeat that 20 years later is really special and it’s fantastic for the sport of curling,” she said.

The gold winning athlete, who was reunited with her friends and family after not seeing them for more than a month, said the victory was “starting to sink in” after a “wild” few days.

“It’s funny because you are out there in a really tight bubble,” she said.

“We have had our phones off with different numbers and no social media, and when I landed back in London last night I put my phone on and, honestly, it’s not stopped.”

The support extended to the arrival lounge at the airport, with Union-flag clad friends and family cheering their Olympic heroes as they arrived back in Scotland.

Dodds said: “It’s such a great feeling. Obviously they weren’t able to be in Beijing, like a lot of them would have (liked to have) been there, our family especially, so it’s just really special to enjoy that moment all over again.

“It’s almost like getting the gold medal for the first time. And just seeing how proud they were, that was something really special.”

Duff’s parents, Brenda and John Duff,