Sheffield Steelers captain Robert Dowd on Winter Olympics dream and facing Coventry Blaze on the road

The Sheffield Steelers’ captain has played an integral role for the national team over the last 10 years or so, including in May when he helped them return to the top tier of the World Championships at the first attempt.

That came as the result of a 5-3 win over Italy at Nottingham’s Motorpoint Arena, a result which meant the hosts won all five of their games in the Division 1A group.

Dowd is likely to be among the squad picked by head coach Pete Russell that will head out to Prague next May to slug it out with leading hockey nations such as Canada, Finland, the hosts and Switzerland.

Before then, though, GB have been handed home ice advantage for February’s pre-qualification round for the Winter Olympics which will be staged in Italy in 2026.

Announced yesterday, the tournament will be held at Cardiff’s Vindico Arena from February 8-11, GB will come up against Romania, China and a qualifier yet to be determined from the previous round.

The group winners will then progress to final qualifying in August 2024 when the winners will earn a spot at the main Games, which will be held in Milan and Cortina d'Ampezzo.

“Having any tournament at home or close to home is always fantastic,” said Dowd, “Having the majority of the crowd on your side and not having to do too much travelling is always a good thing.

"We’ve enjoyed some special moments over the last few years at the World Championships, but to get to the Winter Olympics would provide lifelong memories for everyone on the team.

"With the Olympics being only once every four years, getting there would be something just that little bit extra special.”

On the domestic front, this weekend sees the Steelers facing just the one game in the Elite League, heading to the SkyDome Arena to take on Coventry Blaze on Sunday.

The Steelers beat Coventry at home 3-2 in overtime on the opening night of the 2023-24 campaign and are looking to bounce back from Sunday’s 3-2 defeat to Cardiff.

Dowd expects Danny Stewart’s team to be another tough proposition this term.

"I think they’ve got a good group there and like they showed when we played them at ours on the first night of the season, they are a very good team,” added Dowd.

"They’ve already taken a couple of big wins over some teams (they beat Cardiff 4-2 at home) and it will be another very tough game.

"I think we’ve had a really solid start and shown we’re really good on the defensive side of the puck as well as the offensive side of the puck.

"It was obviously very disappointing to lose that one to Cardiff. I think we just started a little bit poor and they got two quick goals and that changed the game.

"We ended up chasing the game and left ourselves with too much to do, even though we dominated the second half of that game.”