International Olympic Committee president Kirsty Coventry is in the spotlight on how she handles her "baptism of fire" over Russia, former IOC executives have told AFP.

With just six months to go to the opening ceremony for the Milan-Cortina Winter Games the odds are that Russian athletes -- normally a Winter Games superpower -- will have to compete under a neutral banner, owing to the country breaching the Olympic Charter.

The IOC excluded the Russian NOC after it had placed under its authority several sports organisations from Ukrainian regions that Russian forces now occupy.

That move came after President Vladimir Putin -- not for the first time in his country's turbulent relationship with the IOC -- broke the Olympic Truce when he launched the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

When the IOC under Thomas Bach -- and with Coventry a member of the Executive Committee -- permitted Russian athletes to compete as neutrals at the Paris Summer Olympics last year, some federations took a far harsher line.

World Athletics barred all athletes from Russia and its allies Belarus from its competitions, as did other........

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