🔗 Share this article

Forget about poor conditions. Currently, the surface isn't ready.

As NHL athletes preparing to make a comeback to the Olympic Games for the first time in more than a ten years, building work on the primary hockey arena for the Milano Cortina Games is cutting it close.

Officials confirmed on Wednesday that the main trial competition for the 16,000-capacity Santagiulia arena originally planned for December has been moved to a more compact arena – and that no additional trial has been arranged yet.

This situation raises the prospect that there might not be a match held in the primary venue until the puck is dropped for the women’s preliminary round at the Olympics on 5 February – 24 hours before the inaugural event.

“The timeline will be very close to the beginning of the Olympics, the timeline is highly compressed. However, we were aware,” Milan-Cortina local organizing committee CEO Andrea Varnier said in a recent update.

The event that was intended to test the Santagiulia ice was a segment of the U20 world championship from 8-14 December. This tournament has been transferred to the Rho Fiera hockey venue, which is being established inside a massive convention center on Milan’s outskirts and will host lesser games during the games.

Usually, new Olympic venues are tested at least the prior year to holding medal events. And with a sizable hockey venue, it’s not only about the ice and making sure that the playing surface is ready and secure. It’s also about testing food outlets, restrooms and everything else inside a newly constructed modern stadium.

The Santagiulia venue, which is being built by a private company, is scheduled to become the nation's biggest indoor arena. For after the Olympics, it’s being considered as a potential upcoming venue of the ATP Tour Finals tennis tournament.

In spite of the delays and worries, high-priced passes are already being purchased for matches at the Santagiulia arena. Tickets for the men's championship final on 22 February – the closing day of the games – are going for as much as €1,400 (over $1,600). This exceeds the price of any other sports event at the Milano Cortina Games. Solely passes for the inaugural and final events cost more.

The return of NHL players at the Olympics was announced in February of last year, with the premier hockey organization allowing its athletes to participate in the Winter Olympics for the initial occasion since 2014 in Sochi.

Men's Olympic hockey tournament is scheduled to run from 11-22 February. The women’s tournament runs from 5-19 February.