Olympics-Curling-Tempers flare as Canada beat Sweden in men's competition

By Aadi Nair

CORTINA D'AMPEZZO, Italy, Feb 13 (Reuters) - Tensions boiled over as Brad Jacobs' Canada beat Sweden 8-6 in an intense round-robin curling game on Friday, with Niklas Edin's team alleging that their opponents were double touching the stone during the contest.

Trouble began early when the game was halted for a while after Sweden claimed Canada's curlers were touching the stone following release and asked officials to keep an eye out for further incidents.

In response, Canada asked for the officials to do the same on Sweden's delivery, leading to a frosty atmosphere between the teams.

After Sweden scored two in the penultimate end to leave Canada with the hammer and a 7-6 lead, there was another heated exchange between the teams' thirds Marc Kennedy and Oskar Eriksson.

Eriksson told Kennedy he would show him a replay of him touching the stone repeatedly, with the Canadian telling his counterpart to "fuck off".

Asked about the exchange, Kennedy said: "It's good. It's sport. It's the Olympics. Both teams are trying to win. Oskar was accusing us of cheating. I didn't like it. I've been curling professionally for 25 years."

World Curling has introduced electronic handles on the stones at these Games, which flash red if players are still making contact with the stone beyond the hog line - the point where curlers must let go during delivery.

Each stone's handle is fitted with a touch sensor, which interacts with a magnetic strip embedded in the ice.

HOG LINE DEVICES

"There's hog line devices on there. I don't know. And he's still accusing us of cheating. I didn't like it. So I told him where to stick it," Kennedy said.

"Because we're the wrong team to do that to. So I don't care."

Sweden lost the opening two games in their title defence to Britain and Italy before their defeat at the hands of Canada.

"He might have been upset that he was losing," Kennedy added. "He might be upset that they're 0-2, grasping for straws. I just told him again. I said I have a ton of respect for him as a player. I've never said a bad word about Oskar Eriksson.

"I don't really know what he's trying to get out of it. And yeah, onward. But I'm not going to stand there and take cheating lightly."

Eriksson said he and Sweden's players believed Kennedy was touching the stone and not the handle containing the sensor, meaning the red lights did not flash.

"He asked who we thought was over the hog line and I pointed out who we thought was touching the rock," he added.

"It was obviously not a red light, but some players are touching the rock according to us. And that's not allowed ... We told the officials. They came out and they misread the rules, sadly.

"Because they thought double touching any part of the rock is okay. And then they found out that was wrong. You can only touch the electronic part of the handle."

Swedish skip Edin said it was sad to see the back-and-forth between players.

"We're all super good friends out there," he added.

"We've known them for 20 years. And it's (rule violations) happened many times before, so it's just sad that it gets to heated discussions on the ice instead of just curling, according to the rulebooks, but it's what it is."

In a statement, World Curling said umpires had been set at the hog line to monitor deliveries for three ends after the issue was first raised during the game.

"There were no hog line violations or retouches of the stone during the observation," the statement added.