FIFA Club World Cup 2025 Referees: All You Need to Know

After an extensive preparation phase that involved seminars with FIFA referees from all six confederations, the FIFA Referees Committee chose the match officials designated to officiate at the innovative FIFA Club World Cup 2025, scheduled to occur from 14 June to 13 July across 12 stadiums in 11 cities throughout the United States.

A total of 117 match officials comprising 35 referees, 58 assistant referees, and 24 video match officials from 41 member associations were selected to oversee the matches.

How FIFA Selects Referees for the Club World Cup

FIFA’s selection procedure is strict, transparent, and fair. It is based on merit. This is a brief overview of the process:

Representatives from of the six FIFA confederations - UEFA, CONMEBOL, AFC, CAF, OFC and CONCACAF, etc.

Here is the list of selected officials who have been officiating the 2025 FIFA Club World Cup.

AFC (5)

Omar Al Ali UAE (Reserve referee)

Alireza Faghani IRN

Salman Falahi - QAT

Ma Ning - CHN (Reserve referee)

Ilgiz Tantashev - UZB

CAF (5)

Dahane Beida - MTN

Mustafa Ghorbal - ALG

Mutaz Ibrahim - LBY (Reserve referee)

Jean-Jacques Ndala - COD (Reserve referee)

Issa Sy - SEN

CONCACAF (5)

Iván Barton - SL

Drew Fischer - CAN 

Said Martínez - HON

Tori Penso - USA

César Ramos - MEX

CONMEBOL (8)

Ramon Abatti Abel - BRA

Juan Gabriel Benítez - PAR

Yael Cristian Falcón Pérez - ARG

Cristián Marcelo Garay Reyes - CHI

Wilton Pereira Sampaio - BRA

Gustavo Adrián Tejera Capo - URU (Reserve referee)

Facundo Raúl Tello Figueroa - ARG

Jesús Noel Valenzuela Sáez - VEN

OFC (1):

Campbell-Kirk Kawana-Waug - NZL (Reserve referee)

UEFA (11)

Espen Eskas - NOR, Istvan Kovacs - ROU, François Letexier - FRA, Danny Makkelie - NED, Szymon Marciniak - POL, Glenn Nyberg - SWE, Michael Oliver - ENG, Anthony Taylor - ENG, Clèment Turpin - FRA, Slavko Vinčić - SVN, Felix Zwayer - GER.

Commenting on the appointment of Team One, the chairman of the FIFA Referees Committee, Pierluigi Collina, said that it would be a “privilege” for those chosen to officiate at the very first edition of the FIFA Club World Cup: “As every new competition starts, the selected referees are among those who have the privilege to be part of this for the first time, so I’m sure that all the match officials will be thrilled.”

“We are coming from high standard performances delivered during the last FIFA tournaments. So the bar is higher and when you get the bar higher, it’s more difficult to keep the standard. But we are working very hard and Team One will make a solid contribution to the success of this exciting competition.”

“I like to compare the preparation of a football team and a referee team because both need to work hard and deliver to the highest standards,” noted FIFA Director of Refereeing Massimo Busacca.

“We try to find as much uniformity and consistency as possible in what we are doing because football is the same everywhere, but we know that we have to understand the different mentality in football, and this is crucial.”

Here are the lists of the 24 video match officials VAR (24)

Khamis Al-Marri - QAT

Mahmoud Ashour - EGY

Ivan Bebek - CRO

Jerome Brisard - FRA

Bastian Dankert - GER

Carlos Del Cerro - Grande ESP

Marco Di Bello - ITA

Rob Dieperink - NED

Hamza El Fariq - MAR

Shaun Evans - AUS

Nicolás Gallo Barragán - COL

Leodán Franklin González Cabrera - URU

Tatiana Auxiliadora Guzmán Alguera - NCA

Alejandro José Hernández Hernández - ESP

Tomasz Kwiatkowski POL

Juan Ignacio Lara Luco - CHI

Hernán Mastrángelo - ARG

Fu Ming - CHN

Érick Yair Miranda Galindo - MEX

Mohammed Obaid Khadim - UAE

Guillermo Pacheco Larios - MEX

Juan Ernesto Soto Arevalo - VEN

Bram Van Driessche BEL

Armando Villarreal - USA

The list of match officials appointed for the ongoing FIFA Club World Cup is available here.