Tournament’s 117 match officials have a “privilege, but also a responsibility” in representing their countries, FIFA Referees Committee Chairman Pierluigi Collina tells The FIFA Club World Cup Show podcast
FIFA Team One will represent 41 different nationalities at the FIFA Club World Cup 2025 in the United States
“Every match will be important for us,” says Mr Collina, who will have a birds eye view on all 63 games
Chairman of the FIFA Referees Committee Pierluigi Collina has told The FIFA Club World Cup Show podcast the cosmopolitan slice of countries represented by the 2025 tournament’s match officials is “something very important” for the global game. Earlier this week, FIFA announced the 117 match officials – 35 referees, 58 assistant referees and 24 video match officials – who will take charge of the 63 games of the new tournament held in the United States from 14 June to 13 July this year.
While there are 86 different nationalities represented among the current squads of the 32 participating clubs, the group of match officials – known as FIFA Team One – represent 41 countries among FIFA’s 211 Member Associations from Australia to Venezuela and Uzbekistan to Argentina. “We work very much to develop refereeing worldwide,” said Mr Collina. “We pay great attention to this matter and the result is to be able to select referees from many, many countries. Of course, we have some which are historically known as football countries, but we have very, very good match officials even from countries you would never expect.” He added: “They feel the honour to represent their own country, but also the responsibility. Imagine that there are referees who are coming from countries (whose) national team (has) never participated in a FIFA World Cup final round or clubs of this country cannot participate (in) the FIFA Club World Cup 2025. So, basically, for them, it’s something great, it’s something very important for their countries, for their football association. So, it’s a privilege, but also a responsibility.”
Mr Collina highlighted the importance of the new FIFA Club World Cup™ as a personal and professional experience for the match officials, particularly those who will be participating at a senior FIFA tournament for the first time. “Of course the first one is something that remains in your mind, and I’m sure that for all the 117 match officials selected for the FIFA Club World Cup 2025, being among those who participate (for) the first time ever, certainly is something very exciting for them, because they will be part of the history of football,” explained Mr Collina, himself a former referee whose first elite-level final was at the 1996 Men’s Olympic Football Tournament. “So, that was, for me, my first time, but certainly, having been honoured with the final of the World Cup, the FIFA World Cup™ in 2002 in Yokohama, in Japan, certainly that was another incredible moment in my life.”
In his current role, Mr Collina will keep a close eye on every match of the tournament, which starts when Inter Miami CF and Al Ahly face off at Miami’s Hard Rock Stadium and ends with the first truly global club world champion being crowned at the MetLife Stadium in New York New Jersey. “I cannot wait for the day this competition will start because it’s something great – 32 teams from all around the world, top teams, top players; it will be great, it will be fantastic,” he said. “Then, of course, the job part will take over (from) the passion and it will become very stressful for me because, of course, it’s a matter of succeeding in the competition. I want Team One (to) be the real winner of this competition, so every match will be important for us.”