Team allocation to venues determined – Russia starts in Cologne, Canada in Paris
The International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) has announced the two preliminary groups for the 2017 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship in Germany and France.
Accordingly, in Group A in Cologne, host Germany will face this year's bronze medalist Russia, number 2 in the world rankings, the USA, as well as Sweden, Slovakia, Latvia, Denmark and Italy.
Co-host France will play in Group B in Paris against defending champion Canada, silver medalist Finland, the Czech Republic, Switzerland, Belarus, Norway and Slovenia.
The group breakdown is based on the 2016 IIHF Men's World Ranking and has been slightly adjusted to reflect the specific requirements of the two co-hosts.
Cologne, the largest city in the Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan region with over 10 million inhabitants, is the main venue with a capacity of 18.500 spectators LANXESS arena, the largest multifunctional arena used for ice hockey in Europe. A total of 34 games will be played there, including Group A, two quarter-final games and the semi-final and medal games.
In Paris, the capital of France with over 12 million inhabitants in the metropolitan region, the AccorHotels Arena Bercy will host 30 games, including Group B and two quarter-finals. The arena recently underwent a major renovation and was expanded to accommodate 14.500 spectators.
The tournament will take place from May 5th to 21st, 2017 in the two cities, which are connected by the Thalys high-speed train (Cologne-Paris in 3:14 hours).
The schedule will be announced at a later date.
However, ticket packages can already be purchased as follows:
Online booking via the official website www.iihfworlds2017.com
By telephone at +49 (0)1806 2017 01 (0,20 €/call incl. VAT from landline networks, max. 0,60 €/call incl. VAT from mobile networks // Monday-Friday 10.00 a.m. to 19.00 p.m. and Saturday from 12.00 p.m. to 19.00 p.m.)
For more information visit www.iihfworlds2017.com.