Story highlights 32 Russian athletes appeal to the CAS

Winter Olympics starts February 9

(CNN) Just days before the curtain rises on the Winter Olympics, it's still not certain who will be competing.

While the organizers of the Games -- the International Olympic Committee -- would prefer to be talking about the excitement of Winter Olympic sports and the star athletes of PyeongChang 2018, instead it's embroiled in courtroom battles.

In the next few days, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) -- sport's top arbitration body -- will hear an appeal by a group of Russian athletes who are challenging the decision to exclude them from the Winter Olympics, almost a month after they were excluded from the competition.

The CAS will hear the case for 32 Russian athletes, which requests that the International Olympic Committee's decision to not invite them to participate be overturned.

A hearing is "likely" to be held on February 7 -- two days before the Games' Opening Ceremony -- according to a press release from the CAS. Even if CAS upholds the appeal the IOC can still decline to accept the 32 athletes who have petitioned to take part in the Games.