France and Italy women play the first game at the newly built Olympic…

France and Italy women play the first game at the newly built Olympic…

MILAN (AP) — The puck dropped Thursday on the first game at the Milan Cortina Olympics in the newly built hockey enviornment that wanted a rush to the eleventh hour to complete.

The women’s game between host Italy and France adopted a number of days of practices on the model new sheet of ice that needed to be labored on following a sequence of take a look at occasions at Milano Santagiulia Ice Hockey Arena. Ice grasp Don Moffatt was frightened as just lately as early last week about getting the floor prepared in time for the Olympics.

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None of the years of scrutiny and worries over development delays had been evident inside the seating bowl, even if there was still a stretch of rubber matting across one facet of the ice until roughly 20 minutes before pregame warmups.

It was enterprise as regular for the Zamboni and enviornment operations workers, while followers filed into the stands. Many took seats that had been only put in within the past couple of months, and even so the capability was diminished to 11,600 from an unique plan for 14,700.

On the concourse, it was apparent that some corners needed to be reduce to finish the job, however concession stands had been working and the muddle and development that lingered into Wednesday had been nowhere to be seen.

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AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics

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