Moscow, Jan 31 (IANS): International football governing body FIFA has downsized its requirements for the number of hotels to be built for guests at the 2018 Russia World Cup to prevent their lying idle after the tournament, the director general of the Local Organising Committee (LOC) Alexei Sorokin has said.

The 2018 World Cup starts on June 14, 2018. The 500-day countdown to the tournament was launched in Russia on Monday, reports Tass.

"Nothing is being built specifically for the World Cup. All the facilities that are being built are essential for the host cities, their residents. We have managed to have FIFA somewhat scale down requirements to the number of hotels so that we don't have idling facilities after the championship," Sorokin told Match TV channel on Monday.

"We have optimised requirements to each region based on the quality of matches to be held in this or that city."

"In general, we are ready (to provide accommodation to the 2018 World Cup guests). In some cities, the situation is perfect, in others not that good. But in general, we are meeting all the requirements. The situation is favourable. A special government decree is geared to control the situation with prices appointed by hotels for the period of the tournaments. It means there will be no speculative prices. We are immune to that," he said.

Russia selected 11 host cities to be the venues for the matches of the 2018 World Cup and they are Moscow, St. Petersburg, Sochi, Kazan, Saransk, Kaliningrad, Volvograd, Rostov-on-Don, Nizhny Novgorod, Yekaterinburg and Samara.

The matches of the 2018 World Cup will be held between June 14 and July 15 at 12 stadiums located in 11 cities across Russia. Two of the stadiums are located in the Russian capital of Moscow.