Sawt Falasteen - Winter Olympic organisers insist ice hockey arena ready despite hole in rink

Asked whether there was any possibility that the venue, in the eastern Santa Giulia district of Milan, would not be ready to host matches International Olympic Committee (IOC) sport director Pierre Ducrey told reporters: "No chance at all."

And organisers said they were not worried even after an Italian Cup match played on the rink on Friday was briefly stopped due to the hole, which was quickly patched up.

Don Moffatt, who works for the Colorado Avalanches in the National Hockey League (NHL) and is in charge of the ice at the Olympic rink, told AFP via a spokesman that he is happy with the ice and that such teething problems can happen the first time a rink is skated on.

Officially called the Milano Santagiulia Ice Hockey Arena, the rink is scheduled to host 33 preliminary and knock-out games at the upcoming Olympics, which run between February 6 and 22.

Organisers told AFP it is structurally ready and that the remaining needed works -- visible both in the stands and the concourses -- are simply "the finishing touches".

Ducrey insisted that players from the National Hockey League (NHL), widely regarded as the world's top hockey league, will compete at the Olympics for the first time since 2014.

Their participation was called into question as recently as last month by the NHL's deputy commissioner Bill Daly, due to concerns about the playing surface.

"We're very excited they're coming back," Ducrey said to reporters at the ice rink.

"Twelve years. It was a lot of work from a lot of people to make sure this happens. You will have NHL players here in February, and it's going to be amazing."

Andrea Francisi, Chief Games Operations Officer for Milan-Cortina, added that the NHL players' participation was guaranteed "100 percent".

- Sore point -

The ice hockey arena is one of the few entirely new venues built for the Olympics, which span a vast area of northern Italy from economic capital Milan to the Dolomite mountains that straddle the country's borders with Austria and Slovenia.

It is a multi-sport complex -- which Olympics organisers told AFP will have a capacity of 15,300 -- and is expected to host basketball games and concerts after the Games.

Organisers also told AFP that the number of "sellable tickets" for the Olympic hockey matches will be 11,800 due to the presence of media and delegations in the stands.

The arena's construction has been one of the sore points of preparations for the Olympics, with the late delivery and rink quality causing concern for both the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) and NHL.

Over Friday and Sunday, the arena will host fixtures which will decide Italy's top ice hockey league and cup competitions, a month later than the original test event which had to be moved to the Games' secondary ice rink in Milan's western suburbs due to the state of the venue.

"We will have a site visit with the NHL and also NHLPA (players' association) next (this coming) Sunday. But let me say, everything was planned together with IOC Sport, the IIHF, NHL and NHLPA," added Francisi.

"It's not only us. It's a big cooperation between all the parties involved for the hockey tournament."

Speaking to AFP, IIHF chief Luc Tardif also expressed positivity about the state of play.

"For a few months there were still some worries, but since my last visit a week ago, I'm a bit more confident," said Tardif.

"When I saw everything that they've done in the space of a week, the sporting facilities... for our federation it's very important.

"You can see that there are still things to be finished, plenty of things, but we have three weeks in which it will be much easier than it has been up to now for work to be done."

The women's ice hockey tournament starts on February 5 before the NHL stars take to the ice in the men's tournament on February 11.

B.AbuZeid--SF-PST