Five things to know about Team Canada skip Brad Gushue

Brad Gushue and his Canada team had the chance to clinch a men's curling semi-final spot when they faced ROC on Tuesday (15 February).

However, Sergei Glukhov's rink came out on top, winning 7-6 after an extra end.

This leaves the Canadians needing a win against Great Britain on Thursday to guarantee their place in the last four, or face a nervous wait to see how ROC, USA and Switzerland fare in their closing round-robin games.

Plenty of attention will be on Turin 2006 gold medallist Gushue and his team ahead of their final round robin match.

Here are five things you need to know about them.

Good form

Team Gushue had been on a run of consecutive wins before Tuesday's defeat to ROC.

The Canadians brushed aside reigning champions USA 10-5 on Saturday with a 7-1 margin after five ends prompting them to bring in alternate Marc Kennedy - gold medallist with skip Kevin Martin at Vancouver 2010 - to play the second half.

They followed that up with a 7-3 victory over Italy and a 10-8 decision over China.

This run also highlighted Team Gushue's ability to bounce back from defeat, as they had gone down to Switzerland and world champions Sweden in their previous two games.

They will need to show that resilience again on Thursday if they are to make the semi-finals later that day.

Big-game experience

Beijing 2022 is Gushue's second Games appearance having skipped Canada to goal in Turin 16 years ago.

They came through the round-robin with a 6-3 record before scoring an 11-5 victory over the United States who had current skip John Shuster playing lead.

A score of five in the ninth end saw the Americans concede before the final end.

Surprise packages Finland awaited in the final and a score of six in the sixth end helped Canada take gold 10-4 with two ends to spare.

Mark Nichols played third for Gushue in Turin, and he is back to try and win a second Olympic crown.

History of success

Gushue has also enjoyed success outside of the Games.

How fierce competition is within Canada is reflected in the fact that it was not until 2017 that he made his first World Championship appearance.

But it was worth the wait with Team Gushue beating Sweden on home ice in Edmonton to take gold.

The Swedes were the opponents again in the final in Las Vegas the following year, but this time it was Niklas Edin's rink which came out on top.

Last year he teamed up with Kerri Einarson in the World Mixed Doubles Championships held in Scotland, but they suffered a semi-final defeat to Scotland's eventual winners Jen Dodds and Bruce Mouat - who took fourth for Great Britain in Beijing.

He has also played mixed doubles with his daughter Hayley.

Familiar teammates

Nichols is the longest-serving member of Team Gushue with the pair playing together since 1998.

He was part of the gold medal rink in Turin but sat out the 2011/12 to 2013/2014 seasons.

Lead Geoff Walker has been with Gushue for 11 consecutive seasons with second Brett Gallant the newbee of the quartet with just the 10 seasons.

Gallant played third for his first two seasons in Team Gushue but switched to second when Nichols returned to the rink.

That familiarity with each other and how they each operate - including the world title triumph - is something that will help them going into their all-important clash with Great Britain.

Expecting a test

The Olympics is the ultimate competition to be a part of and Gushue always knew he was going to be tested.

“It’s going to be a really difficult field," he told the Canadian Olympic Committee before the Games.

“There is so much quality around the world that we can go in and play well and still not come away with the gold medal. The quality is so much higher… so much deeper.

“So we know we’ve got a challenge ahead of us. But I do think if we play to our capabilities we’re going to be there at the end of the week… whether it’s gold, silver, bronze, we’ll see.”

After the loss against ROC, Gushue was quoted by CBC as saying: "We get a day off tomorrow. We will rest up, cheer for whoever we need to cheer for to see if things can go our way, but our fate is still in our own hands.

"We've got to win our last game, but we've got a tough match against Great Britain, so [we will] just make sure we're ready for that. Hopefully, a good practice tomorrow can get us back where we need to be."

When can I watch Team Gushue in action?

Canada's all-important match against Great Britain comes on Thursday 17 February at 09:05 Beijing time (20:05 EST, 17:05 PST on Wednesday).

Should the Canadians make it through, they will play in the semi-finals at 20:05 that evening.

The loser of that game will play for bronze on Friday at 14:05, while the winners go through to the gold medal match 24 hours later.