By Mark Staniforth, PA Sport, Salt Lake City

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Rhona Martin's curlers sealed an extraordinary Olympic comeback to beat the supposedly-invincible Canadians and guarantee themselves at least a silver medal in Salt Lake City.

Only two days ago, a morose Martin had insisted ``we are out, we are dead'' after a preliminary-round defeat to Germany left Britain's fate in others' hands.

On Wednesday their revival was almost complete as they shattered the reigning Olympic and world champion's expectations with a stunning 6-5 win at the Ogden Ice Sheet.

Britain will play for gold on Thursday against Switzerland, who they have already beaten in the preliminary round.

Martin said: ``At the end of the round robin, we were not at the top of our game. We seem to be playing like I know we should now. We came out from under a lot of pressure and now we have a chance of gold.''

Britain, represented by Scots Debbie Knox, Fiona MacDonald and Janice Rankin as well as skipper Martin, built on a fortunate advantage they had gained with a two-stone win in the fourth end.

Canadian captain Kelley Law, attempting a draw, knocked a second British stone into the house to give the underdogs a 3-1 lead.

Martin took a 5-3 advantage into the eight, but the Canadians clawed back to level before the last end, in which Britain's final stone proved decisive.

MacDonald said: ``It's just wonderful. It's a great feeling. It's what we've been playing for here and it's why we are here.''

Britain's resurrection has been nothing short of miraculous. They blew qualification chances against America and Germany and only Switzerland's win over the Germans kept their hopes alive.

They then battled their way through two play-off matches against Sweden and the Germans again on Tuesday to earn the dubious privilege of a clash with the all-conquering Canadians.

Memories must have been vivid of the British team's fate four years ago, when they lost their semi-final to Canada by the slimmest of margins and went on to miss out on a bronze medal.

This time they made no mistake, leaving the stunned Canadians facing the bronze medal play-off this time around against America.

Law said: ``Great Britain played fairly well and that's the way it goes sometimes. We battled back and played okay, but Rhona had to make the shot on the last rock to win and she did.''

The team, who all represent Greenacres Curling Club in Scotland, had come into the tournament with only an outside chance of squeezing into the semi-finals.

Martin, 35, had led Scotland to the silver medal at the European Championships in 1998 and to fourth at the World Championships in Glasgow in 2000.

But this proved by far her biggest scalp. All eyes were on the Canadians, whose nation makes up 94% of the world curling population and who have been unbackable favourites to win a repeat gold.

The victory seemed to have come as a sensation to all but Britain's skipper herself.

The unflappable Martin shrugged: ``We will not think about tomorrow until tomorrow. We are going for the gold now. We played well.''

Meanwhile, Emma Carrick-Anderson came 19th in the women's slalom and the men's biathletes were 11th and last in the 4x7.5km relay.