Skip Eve Muirhead might be getting the most attention, but Great Britain’s world champion women’s curling team are heading into the Sochi Winter Olympics very much as an interdependent unit, according to third Anna Sloan.
Muirhead’s profile has grown considerably over the last few years, with her skipping a GB rink of players much older than her at Vancouver 2010 at the age of 19, and then a young Scotland team to victory at both the 2011 European Championships and 2013 World Championships.
The foursome that secured those golds Muirhead, Sloan, second Vicki Adams and lead Claire Hamilton is that which will compete as GB in Sochi next month along with alternate Lauren Gray, and the skip looks set to be a poster girl for her country at the Games.
But Sloan has emphasised that within ‘Team Muirhead’ there is a keen sense of the importance of everyone’s respective roles.
The 22-year-old from Lockerbie, who has been a skip herself, said: “I think Eve handles the attention well, and between us, as long as we all know we are as important in the team as each other, then to be honest, it doesn’t really matter what the outside world thinks.
“I could not do Eve’s job as well as she does, and she could not do my job as well as I do. It all just works well together.”
The group all aged between 22 and 24 are very close as friends, something Sloan feels has been a key factor in their success.
“I think it really helps that we spend so much time together and that we know each other really well and get on,” Sloan said.
“I think we are really lucky to have a group of girls that travel and spend so much time together that actually get on really well and are good friends off the ice is really good.
“We went on holiday to watch the men’s worlds together, and I live with Vicki.
“I think because we spend so much time together, we know how one another functions. We know when to speak and when not to speak, when someone is tired, and I think it just works really well.”
At the same time, Sloan is in no doubt that in Muirhead, the team is skipped by a formidable talent.
Asked what she felt it was that has made Muirhead so good at such a young age, Sloan said: “I think she just has this calmness under pressure.
“She was brought into the limelight at a really young age, but she handled it well.
“She just has this ability to call a good game under the pressure, and we all work really well together with that.”
The team, coached by GB’s 2002 Olympic champion curler Rhona Howie, go into Sochi off the back of a 2013/14 campaign that has so far seen them claim silver at the European Championships, win one Grand Slam event and finish as runner-up in another.
Sloan felt it was vital they continued to improve after the World Championships triumph of last March, and believes they have done so.
“We just know we can’t get complacent. We are going into the Olympics as favourites, but then again, the favourites are always the team that people want to beat,” she said.
“Our consistency levels have gone up this year and we have had a really good season so far, so we need to just build on that.
“It is good to be able to play at a consistent level against really high quality teams and we are going to get that in Sochi.
“So hopefully we will be able to step up to that kind of level again when it comes to it.”