Who knew curling at the 2026 Winter Olympics would be more like a soap opera? The drama first broke out between Canada and Switzerland when the Swiss accused the Canadians of cheating. To be exact, Oskar Eriksson called out Marc Kennedy for double-touching the stone before releasing it. Kennedy raged, “F**** off!” and said he didn’t “give a s*” about reviewing the footage. The same controversy followed the Canadian women’s team. With the sport under the spotlight, another team has been caught in the same act: Great Britain.

In the ninth end of Team GB’s 9–4 win over Germany on Sunday, they had one of their stones removed by one of the revolving umpires. Scotland’s Bobby Lammie was accused of touching the granite after releasing the stone in a forward motion. Despite World Curling outlining that the individual delivering the stone could touch the handle of the stone as much as they wanted, touching the granite while traveling towards and beyond the hog line was illegal and would result in the stone being disqualified.

However, the infraction was clearly not deliberate. The Sun reported that the contact was merely an accidental graze, emphasizing there was no deliberate manipulation involved. Devin Heroux, the CBC Olympics reporter, agreed that this did not impact the shot or give any advantage to the curler.

However, after the fight between the Canadians and the Swiss, the Olympics are being more stringent regarding the rules. “A stone must be clearly released from the hand before it reaches the hog line at the delivery end,” they said in a statement. “If the player fails to do so, the stone is immediately removed from play by the delivering team.”

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They also added two officials between the games to specifically look at such penalties. Double touch has been notoriously uncommon in curling for the past few years, which is why Britain looked surprised after the call but gracefully accepted the decision. Britain’s curlers reportedly backed the enhanced officiating measures despite falling foul of them. They went on to win the game regardless. The team later took on unbeaten Switzerland, and that game did not turn out as well.

Great Britain Looking Forward To Facing Switzerland in the Winter Olympics After Close Loss

Bruce Mouat of Great Britain had a chance to complete a huge upset. They were trailing 4–5 coming into the 10th end, needing at least two points to take the match. The opportunity presented itself to Mouat with his final stone. The skip was assigned to deliver his draw to the button while avoiding the congestion at the front of the house.

Unfortunately, Mouat’s final throw kissed one of the Swiss rocks blocking the path through, taking the game to an extra end. Switzerland eventually won 6–5. “It was a great game,” vice-skip Grant Hardie told BBC Sport. “It could have gone either way, but they took their chance in the end.”

The medal is still in sight, as a win over Sweden would put them in the semifinals. However, there they could face the Swiss yet again, who could single-handedly break British hearts. Yet Mouat is looking forward to a rematch. “If we do see them [Switzerland] again, we’re probably doing something right. They’re playing amazingly right now. So yeah, it’s going to be exciting if we do get to play them again,” he said. “It’s two teams locking heads, I guess, and trying their best to make life as hard as possible for the other team.”

With the cheating controversy in the rearview mirror, Britain will focus solely on their performance at the Winter Olympics. They treated the infraction in the way they should have, brushed it off, and focused on their controllables. They had no such callout in the game against Switzerland. Britain currently stands at No. 3 in the round-robin standings with a 4–2 record.