The three-time Olympic champion joined celebrated figure skater Irina Rodnina to set the lantern ablaze after a three-hour ceremony which offered a whistle-stop tour of Russia’s history and culture, from ancient ritual to the space age.

And Tretiak was not the only hockey figure involved. Another legend, Vyacheslav Fetisov, was among the Russian personalities carrying the Olympic flag. Four nations – Canada, Latvia, Slovakia and Slovenia – picked players from their rosters to carry their flags at the big event. Hayley Wickenheiser, Sandis Ozolins, Zdeno Chara and Tomaz Razingar enjoyed the honour.

Elsewhere in the ceremony, meanwhile, visitors to the Games were invited to explore a wider range of Russian culture. The cast of the big event ranged from Peter the Great, sailing his crew across a stormy sea to St. Petersburg, to a fiery pagan sun symbol hauled across the vast Fisht Stadium by a troika of giant illuminated horses.

Music and dance were the unifying features of the evening. Audiences were whisked to the ballrooms of Imperial Russia for a recreation of Natasha Rostova’s ball from Tolstoy’s epic ‘War and Peace’, while one of the most effective scenes neatly captured the complexities of the Soviet era with a stunning display of design inspired by the avant-garde and rapid industrialization of the 1930s.

By adopting some of the characteristic design traits which have captured the imagination of people far beyond Russia’s borders, the show effectively stepped away from the potential controversies of Russia’s recent history and presented an image which could appeal to a wider audience. On stage, beneath a thundering steam locomotive, dancers delivered a choreography which reflected elements of the ground-breaking balletic works associated with Russia’s long stage tradition.