Qualifying for the ice hockey tournament at the 2022 Winter Olympic Games is to set in Sanya tomorrow

Qualifying for the ice hockey tournament at the 2022 Winter Olympic Games in Beijing is set to begin in Sanya on the Chinese island of Hainan tomorrow.

Hong Kong will join Chinese Taipei, Kuwait and Thailand in seeking top position in the single round-robin tournament, carrying a place in the second round that will take place in three groups in Croatia, Romania and Spain in December.

The winner of Group O and the winner of Group N in Luxembourg - which also includes the United Arab Emirates, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kyrgyzstan and is due to start at the Patinoire de Kockelscheuer on Friday (November 8) - will advance to the second round of the qualification for Beijing 2022.

The higher-seeded of the two group winners will play the second round in Group L in Barcelona in Spain, and the lower-seeded of the two teams in Group K in Brasov, Romania.

Hong Kong had originally been the host of Group O, but was moved by the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) because of the continuing unrest. 

TUS Ice And Snow Park in Sanya is the new host for the start of the IIHF Olympic pre-qualification Round One Group O after it was moved from Hong Kong because of the unrest there ©Wikipedia
TUS Ice And Snow Park in Sanya is the new host for the start of the IIHF Olympic pre-qualification Round One Group O after it was moved from Hong Kong because of the unrest there ©Wikipedia

The event will now be played at the TUS Ice And Snow Park in Sanya with action due to conclude on Sunday (November 10).

The tournament in Luxembourg will finish on the same day. 

The top-eight nations in the 2019 IIHF men's world ranking have automatically qualified for Beijing 2022.

They are Canada, Russia, Finland, Sweden, Czech Republic, the United States, Germany and Switzerland.

Together with host China and the three qualifiers, they will be seeded according to the 2020 IIHF world rankings. 

The three qualifiers will be determined in four stages of the Olympic qualification, culminating with groups in Slovakia, Latvia and Norway to be held between August 27 and 30 next year.