Milano Ice Hockey Arena Setbacks Could Force NHL Stars on Untested Ice

Forget about thin ice. For now, there’s no ice.

As NHL athletes gearing up to return to the Olympics for the first time in over a decade, construction on the main hockey venue for the Milano Cortina Games is going down to the wire.

Local organizers announced on Wednesday that the main trial competition for the 16,000-seat Santagiulia facility originally planned for December has been relocated to a smaller arena – and that no additional trial has been arranged yet.

This situation raises the prospect that there might not be a game held in the main arena until the competition begins for the women’s preliminary round at the Olympics on 5 February – one day before the opening ceremony.

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

The competition that was supposed to evaluate the Santagiulia ice was part of the U20 world championship from 8-14 December. That event has been moved to the Rho Fair hockey venue, which is being established inside a massive convention center on the outskirts of Milan and will stage secondary matches during the games.

Usually, freshly built Olympic facilities are trialled at least the year before to hosting medal events. And with a large hockey venue, it’s not just about the playing surface and ensuring that the playing surface is prepared and safe. It’s additionally about checking food outlets, bathrooms and everything else inside a brand-new modern stadium.

The Santagiulia venue, which is being constructed by a commercial firm, is slated to become the nation's largest indoor arena. For after the Olympics, it’s being eyed as a possible future host of the ATP Tour Finals tennis tournament.

Despite the postponements and worries, high-priced passes are already being purchased for events at the Santagiulia arena. Tickets for the men’s gold medal game on 22 February – the closing day of the Olympics – are priced at as much as €1,400 (more than $1,600). That’s more than the price of any other athletic competition at the Milan-Cortina Games. Solely passes for the inaugural and final events cost more.

The comeback of NHL stars at the Olympics was announced last February, with the premier hockey organization permitting its players to participate in the Winter Olympics for the first time since 2014 in Sochi.

Men's Olympic hockey tournament is scheduled to run from 11-22 February. Women's event runs from 5-19 February.