HELSINKI – Andrei and Sergei Kostitsyn will join the Belarusian national team on Friday.

After talking to the players and the Nashville Predators, the Belarusian Ice Hockey Association announced that the Kostitsyn brothers will land in Helsinki on Friday morning. They are expected to play their first game on Saturday against Slovakia.

It will be the seventh IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship for Andrei and the second one for his two years younger brother Sergei.

Both have been playing together since the Montreal Canadiens traded Andrei Kostitsyn to the Nashville Predators in February.

On the international stage they played together in a couple of events starting with the 2003 U18 World Championship, two U20 World Championships (2004, 2005) and for the last time at the 2008 IIHF World Championship in Quebec City, Canada.

Andrei Kostitsyn also played at the 2011 IIHF World Championship in Slovakia while Sergei’s last international event was the 2010 Olympic Winter Games in Vancouver.

Belarus started into the 2012 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship with two tight losses to Finland and Switzerland, but got its first win on Tuesday, 3-1 vs. Kazakhstan.

With the Kostitsyn brothers, Martin Erat (Czech Republic), Roman Josi (Switzerland) and Craig Smith (USA) there will be five Nashville players at the Worlds.

Another one will not join. The Russian Hockey Federation confirmed today that Alexander Radulov can’t come due to a knee surgery.

MARTIN MERK