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| Russia's goaltender Semyon Varlamov, center, turns to find the puck as Finland scores a goal in the first period of a men's ice hockey game at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, in this Feb. 19, 2014, photo. Finland won 3-1. / AP-Yonhap |
By Nam Hyun-woo
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Ice hockey has been one of the most popular competitions in previous Winter Olympics, but it has never aroused the kind of interest that figure skating has among Koreans. Success of the hockey event is crucial for the 2018 PyeongChang Games, but the organizers seem to be confused about how to go about it.
On Tuesday, the PyeongChang Organizing Committee for the 2018 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games (POCOG) held its first regular news conference in Sogyeok-dong, Seoul, and briefed the media about its plans for 2015.
During the conference, however, the POCOG Vice Presidents Kwak Young-jin and Kim Sang-pyo provided vague explanations about some recent issues, and were unprepared to answer questions about what to do with the men's ice hockey venue.
For the Olympic Games, seven venues are under construction in Gangwon Province. One of them is the Yulgok Hockey Center, a four-story building which houses one ice rink and 10,000 seats on a 19,000-square-meter site in Gangneung. According to POCOG, building the center will cost 108 billion won.
However, POCOG and Gangwon Province have had a hard time in coming up with a plan to use the expensive venue after the Olympics, and are even planning to demolish the center if there is no entity to run it.
"POCOG is building a consensus toward demolishing the center, if it is unreasonable to keep it," said Kim, who is the chief of venue planning.
The total cost for the men's ice hockey event, which will last about two weeks, will likely soar further, because demolishing the center will reportedly cost another 100 billion won.
Due to such high costs, some experts have been saying that it would be more economical to hold the marquee Olympic event in Seoul, at the Mokdong Ice Rink.
But the organizers were firmly opposed to such a notion.
"We have never considered such a possibility," said Kwak. "This is no time to discuss sharing the event. Though different parties voice different ideas, it is time to end them and move forward together."
The organizers also gave a wordy explanation about their legacy plan for other venues, saying, "POCOG is seeking better plans," without giving any firm details.
Initially, Korea would not have qualified for the Olympics, because of its low world rankings. But it was granted a spot in the PyeongChang Games after an International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) general congress that allowed the Olympic host country to automatically compete in the event.
