Here is some insight from a russian.
1. The good thing. Emelin played 4 seasons for AkBArs Kazan. There is a strong "finnish community" there, some czechs and swedes too. The coaching staff and the teammates communicate in English with them. Some russain players also have some NA experiece. Point is obvious. It's not all that new to Emelin to communicate in English with his teammates. He might have picked up a term or two even before he came to Montreal.
2. The "bad" thing. He's married and has a little daughter. So he obviously spends some time with his family talking Russian and there is not that much hanging out with buddies. From what I know about Emelin he's quite a family man too. I still think though he's pro enough to understand the importance of learning the language and makes an effort like taking lessons or something.
3. Russain an Czech are pretty close. Plaknec and Emelin should be able to communicate. If a russian and a czech talk to each other in their respective languages they both at least understand each other. Not 100%, but it's enough to have a simple conversation.
4. Kostitsyn is neither of russian descent or russian. He's belorussian, even by his name, which btw is spelled K
astitsyn in Belorussian. So the name on his back is basically an english transcription of a russian spelling. It probably comes from his papers. He's still soviet born, so from his birth certificate on in all the documents his name was put in russian, the official language in all parts of the Soviet Union. Most people his age from Belorussia keep that spelling. Younger ppl from Belorussia normally have the belorusssian spelling though.
5. Belorussian is much closer to Russian than Czech. Much closer. You basically don't need a translation at all. So it's pretty normal that ALL belorussian can talk to russians and vice versa freely. In case of AK it's even irrelevant, because as mentioned above he's soviet born and Russian is his first language. I don't even know if he speaks Belorussian at all.
Well, back to Emelin. He has Markov and Kostitsyn to speak Russian and translate. He proably can have a little chat with Plakanec and I forgot Budaj completely. Slovak is pretty close to Czech and closer to Russian. And after all Emelin should know a little English already. It's probably not enough for an interview yet, but I think he's getting there quicker than most people would expect him to.
And after all in all the leagues and countries players and coaches are coming around much more now and they all learn English to communicate.
Btw we have a young goaltender now getting his first stint with the natonal team: Ilya Ezhov. He's russian born, raised in Montreal since the age of 7, speaks French fluently(
sign him! 
), English too, has a canadian girlfriend. I think this is more and more the shape of things to come.
