“I don't think we have any competitive advantage from winning the past two years. There are two sides to this. On one hand, our players saw first-hand what it's like to become world champions and winners.

“On the other hand, teams are preparing much harder to face the World Champions. There's even an old saying: it's hard to win the world title, but even harder to keep it.

“I agree with the experts who say we're strongest in attack and got good goalies as well.

“Our defense however, lacks star power, if you don't count Gonchar and Markov. Even the Canadian press says that their local team and the US have an advantage in that area. Our goalies are good, and I hope they can make up for any potential mistakes from our defensemen, and our attack is most definitely very strong.

“We have a strong line-up this time around, but big names are one thing and a cohesive unit is another. It is up to coach Vyacheslav Bykov to create good team chemistry and a winning atmosphere in order to succeed,” Vyacheslav Tretyak said.

Russia face Latvia in their opening game on February 16, while their main rivals for gold, games hosts Canada, play Norway on the same day.