Sport and Cinema.com

The sports program of the Sochi 2014 Olympic Winter Games in Russia was expanded by six events recently when the International Olympic Committee (IOC) confirmed the inclusion of ski halfpipe (men and women), women’s ski jumping, biathlon mixed relay, figure skating team event and luge team relay.

Years of planning and wooing in an effort to earn the right to host soccer’s biggest event- the quadrennial World Cup culminated in Zurich today when FIFA President Joseph S. Blatter opened the envelopes to reveal Russia and Qatar as the winners based on a vote of the FIFA Executive Committee.

In what has to be considered a bit of an upset, Russia, which has never hosted the World Cup, with the support of powerful Prime Minister Vladimir Putin (in absentia) and plenty of oil money to finance new stadiums, defeated England and combined bids from Spain/Portugal and Netherlands/Belgium to earn the right to be host for 2018.

The men’s hockey competiton at the XXIst Winter Games in Vancouver will be one of the most coveted tickets form the first day of competiton through to the gold medal match, but will Canada even be in that title game?

There are plenty of world class teams that are capable of winning it all including Sweden, Finland and the Czech Republic.