• Events
• Point of View
• Multimedia

• Prime Minister of the Russian Federation
• Photo Gallery

• Working Day
• Visits within Russia

• International Visits
• Press Conferences

Vladimir Putin, had a meeting with the Russian hockey officials as well as the chief coach and some players of the national hockey team

print

Events / Photos

Taking part in the meeting with Vladimir Putin were: the Russian team's forwards Alexander Ovechkin, Ilya Kovalchuk and Alexei Morozov, chief coach Vyacheslav Bykov, President of the Russian Hockey Federation Vladislav Tretyak, the head of Rossport Vyacheslav Fetisov, the Minister of Sports, Tourism and Youth Policy Vitaly Mutko and the President of the Winter Sports Federation, Chief of the Russian President's Business Administration Department, Vladimir Kozhin.

Vladimir Putin's remarks:

Good afternoon,

First of all, I would like to congratulate you on your victory in the world championship. Your success was greatly appreciated by your supporters in Moscow and the whole country. Thank you very much.

I think the coaches and the athletes have managed to combine the best traditions of the Soviet and Russian hockey school and modern requirements. Of course you gave the game everything you had. The fact that Ilya Kovalchuk brought the game to such a dramatic conclusion is especially indicative and welcome because I think it is one of the most vivid pages at the concluding stage of the world ice hockey championship.

We are making progress in this and indeed in other areas.

We have a youth team and a junior team which have won silver and bronze respectively.

We are launching an ambitious "Continental League" project, which, in addition to our clubs will include clubs from Latvia, Belarus and Tatarstan.

It is great that young athletes - and it is important above all for the young - now have a chance to show their skills to their fans. For the first time the Russian championship will be held this season for the under-21s.

Any victory is a push towards new achievements. Hockey has always been very popular in our country. After your victory it will become even more popular.

Today about 67,000 kids attend sports schools. That is not the limit. That is not enough. We need to promote mass sports, which is what we have been doing in recent years consistently and will do in the near future. The juniors, many of them at least, will compete in Vancouver and later in Sochi in 2014. Of course, their fans will expect results, expect victories.

I suggest that today we talk not only about what has been done for sports and hockey recently, but mainly about what needs to be done soon to strengthen and develop it.

Thank you.