By Elvira Pollina<\/p>\n
MILAN, Jan 11 (Reuters) \u2013 A new ice hockey arena set to stage top matches at the Winter Olympics received a positive review after test games over the weekend and is due to host the return of North America\u2019s NHL stars \u200dto the Games after 12 years, the IOC and the International Ice Hockey Federation said on Sunday.<\/p>\n
Slow progress and delays in the construction of the Santagiulia arena in Milan, in the southeast of the city, has emerged as one of the main headaches in the run-up to the Olympics, co-hosted by Milan and the Alpine resort of Cortina d\u2019Ampezzo from February 6 to February 22.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe still have two games to go. But so \u200cfar, so good,\u201d Christophe Dubi, Olympic Games Executive Director said at a \u200cpress briefing when asked about the review of the venue, held less than a month before the Olympics.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis looks fantastic. The last time I came was before Christmas, and this is radically different,\u201d he added, noting much progress had been made in recent weeks.<\/p>\n
The IOC said initial feedback from an NHL delegation, which had \u200braised concerns about the venue in December, including on the quality of the ice, was good.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have a meeting and a tour with them later but so far what we\u2019ve heard \u200dis very positive,\u201d said Dubi.<\/p>\n
IIHF President Luc Tardif echoed his \u200bwords and added: \u201cThere is no reason that NHL will not come.\u00a0Yesterday was \u200ba good test\u2026 the puck was sliding and there was no bumping.\u201d<\/p>\n
SOME AREAS STILL TO BE FINISHED<\/p>\n
The arena, \u200dwhich will have a capacity of 15,300 spectators,\u00a0hosted 4,000 fans per match over the weekend, when testing was carried out by hosting the Final Four event of Italy\u2019s Championship and the 2025\/2026 Italian Cup.<\/p>\n
Organisers\u00a0dismissed concerns after a brief delay to the action on Friday night during the inaugural match when a small hole close to one of the goals had to be repaired.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was \u200dthe first time the ice had been used at all, and so our ice master was expecting much more of this potentially happening and then after that, it didn\u2019t happen at all, including yesterday \u200dwith three matches in a \u200drow,\u201d said Andrea Varnier, CEO of local organisers Fondazione Milano Cortina 2026.<\/p>\n
Construction \u200bwork is still going on inside the venue, with hospitality areas and \u200blocker rooms \u2060yet to be completed. The media section has also been set \u200cup on a temporary basis.<\/p>\n
Varnier said some behind-the-scene parts of the arena and some of the surroundings might not be fully completed on time.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut what is fundamental for the success of the games, which is, first of all, the field of play, the hospitality areas, the arena inside, and most of the features outside will be finished,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
(Reporting by Elvira Pollina in Milan, additonal reporting by Keith Weir, editing by Giulia \u2060Segreti and Clare Fallon)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Elvira Pollina MILAN, Jan 11 (Reuters) \u2013 A new ice hockey arena set to stage top matches…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":406855,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[556],"tags":[64,63,575,85],"class_list":["post-406854","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nhl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-nhl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406854","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=406854"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406854\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/406855"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=406854"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=406854"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=406854"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}