BRITAIN’S women curlers booked their place in the Sochi 2014 semi-finals on Monday but the men were left facing a play-off showdown with Norway today for a last-four spot of their own.

Eve Muirhead’s world champion rink of Scots beat Russia 9-6 in their morning match before a combination of other results meant they were through to the semi-finals, irrespective of their result in the later encounter with Denmark, which they lost 8-7.

Britain held a 3-2 lead against the Danes and victory looked assured. But Britain allowed the Danes to mount a comeback.

Lene Nielsen’s rink then stole a point from it to wrap up an 8-7 triumph when Muirhead misjudged her final stone delivery.

After finishing fourth in the round-robin rankings, Britain are due to face unbeaten Canada in the semi-finals tomorrow at 1400 local time (1000GMT).

Britain’s men were left with a play-off battle against Norway at 0900 (0500GMT) today after both teams suffered defeat in their final round-robin matches.

Murdoch’s men were up against it after the Chinese moved 5-3 ahead. Britian pulled two back before their opponents settled it 6-5 in the tenth with the final stone.

But by the time that match had finished though, the Norwegians had already gone down 5-3 against the Danes, meaning Norway and Britain finished the ten-team roundrobin stage in joint-fourth, each with records of five wins from nine fixtures.

Norway go into the play-off match with a 7-6 round-robin win over Britain under their belts but Murdoch is not reading much into that.

“We have a good record against these guys (Norway),”

he said. “Obviously we didn’t win this week against them, but we actually quite enjoy playing against them.

“We’re used to their style, we know what we’re going to get and what to exploit.”