By Andrew Warshaw
March 13- They may not be staging the World Cup for another four years but Russian organizers are coming under pressure from within their own ranks to speed up stadium construction.
With Brazil being targeted on an almost daily basis because of much-publicised delays and missed deadlines, the focus has been off the subsequent tournament in 2018 which has had precious little adverse publicity regarding infrastructure.
But that has suddenly changed with sports minister Vitaly Mutko, who chaired Russia’s successful bid, denouncing the slow pace of progress in constructing 12 stadiums across 11 cities.
Most of the them are being built from scratch in a project costing $20 billion. The Fisht Stadium in Sochi, which was used for the opening and closing ceremonies of the Winter Olympics, is complete as is Kazan andSpartak Moscow’s new home, the Otkritie Arena.
But the others are some way off including the main Moscow venue, the highly prized Luzhniki Stadium, which is set to undergo massive renovations.
Mutko was quoted by Russian media as saying the lack of progress was “causing a certain alarm” and demanded construction on all venues begin by the end of this year. Seven apparently remained at the design stage as of January.
“Deadlines are being broken. There are problems in every region,” Mutko added.