Olympic organizers say they’re “100%” confident the NHL won’t pull out of the Milan Cortina Games with the new ice hockey arena finally ready.
Well, almost ready.
Construction delays and concerns about the Santagiulia Ice Hockey Arena have made headlines for weeks. The NHL is returning to the Winter Olympics for the first time since 2014, with the women’s tournament opening Feb. 5.
The league has expressed concern about construction and ice surface quality. NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly said last month in Winnipeg that the league wouldn’t send players if there were safety concerns.
When Andrea Francisi, chief games operations officer for Milan Cortina, was asked Friday how confident he was that NHL players would participate, he said, “100%, 100%.”
IOC sports director Pierre Ducrey agreed.
“I’m very confident they will be here and it’s going to be extremely exciting,” Ducrey said. “We’re very excited they’re coming back; 12 years, there was a lot of work from a lot people to make sure this happens.”
“So, yeah, you will have NHL players here in February and it is going to be amazing.”
The NHL is expected to release a statement after its visit to the new arena. A league delegation is attending a test event over the next three days.
The first match of the test event was briefly delayed to fix what organizers called a small hole in the ice.
A spokesperson from the Milan Cortina organizing committee told The Associated Press the ice master was happy with the surface. Don Moffatt, who works for the Colorado Avalanche, reassured them this was completely normal for the first time ice is skated on.
Florian Wieser, who played in the game, posted to social media: “It was a small hole that was fixed in 5 minutes. Ice was really good, I was surprised how good it was and it will only get better.”
The original test event scheduled in December didn’t happen because of construction delays.
This weekend’s event is less than a month from women’s competition.
On Friday, the arena was obviously far from complete in a cosmetic sense. Seats were missing and there was plastic sheeting everywhere.
But organizers said those were just “the finishing touches.”
“The next two days will be really very important because they will allow us, having three matches a day, to test exactly the days as they will be in the Olympics,” Francisi said.
On Monday, International Ice Hockey Federation President Luc Tardif said parts of the arena might not be fully finished on time.
Ducrey thinks there’s “no chance at all” it won’t be ready for competition.
“(Tardif) will spend the three days here, he’s going to have an opportunity to see the plans, to see the hockey going on … but from our perspective it’s clear,” Ducrey said. “We knew exactly where the venue would be at at this stage, and we are pleased with the progress.”
“A lot more progress will be done so that we are absolutely ready for Games time.”
The men’s Olympic hockey tournament is scheduled Feb. 11-22.
The women’s tournament runs Feb. 5-19.
