September 18, 2015 marked the 1000 days countdown till the FIFA World Cup 2018 in Russia.
The RF Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko told about preparations for this grand international event. 
- The World Cup will take place in Russia, he most beautiful and remarkable country, and it will be top level, I believe. The event will put the wind in footbal for this country's population at large. We have planned a range of football projects, promotion actions, sport forums, and so on. In the course of World Cup 2018 there will be a special activity area  in the Red Square and Manege Square too.

- How is preparation for the World Cup 2018 going?
- A lot of things have  already been arranged: the management system, the steering committee, and the special state committee. Further on, the State Duma has adopted a special law providing all the guarantees, such as visa-free entrance, customs procedures, and so on. The preparation program consists of about 600 events and infrastructure solutions. Thus, for example, the airport in Samara has been reconstructed, a new air terminal complex in Rostov-on-Don has been built, and so on. Next year the stadiums in St. Petersburg and Sochi will be complete.

- What heritage will the  World Cup 2018 provide to us?
- We are going to obtain a cutting-edge physical infrastructure, and will be on a par with the leading countries of the world football community - Italy, England, France, Germany and so on - that have had this infrastructure for a long time already. Of course, we want the Russian football to change for the better as well. We have tackled down to the matter of training our footbal players and put things right in all the national teams.

- Will our national team be able to achieve big progress in the World Cup?
- We have high profile players and with due organization of preparatory work we can perform better than adequately. Now it is important for us to win two remaining matches in the qualifying tournament to the European Championship 2016 in France. It is an important official competition that gives our players an opportunity to gain necessary experience of performing at the highest level for the national team of Russia.

- What is the budget of the FIFA World Cup 2018?
- The operating budget makes about 1 billion Euros. It covers organization expenses and hosting the World Cup. 90 percent of these assests are provided by the FIFA from revenues on selling tickets and telerights.