Top Referees in the World

Speaking about football, people forget that in addition to footballers, there is also a referee on the field. We often do not attach importance to the personality of a referee, while reading football wiki articles. Most of us only criticize or praise his work. But there were real stars, to whom attention was attached as much as to the footballers. Here are some of them.

Graham Poll

An outstanding English referee has been refereeing matches at various levels for 26 years. In total, he participated in 1544 matches. At major tournaments, he refereed matches of the final part of the European championships in 2000 and 2004 and the World Championships in 2002 and 2006. He also worked during the final of the 2005 UEFA Cup.

At the matches of the English Premier League, he worked from 1993 to 2007. The name of Graham Poll is associated with a curious case. At the World Cup 2006, in the match Croatia-Australia, he managed to show 3 yellow cards to the Croatian Josip Šimunić without removing the player after the second card. After the ensuing criticism, Poll said he realized his mistake and stopped working at international matches.

Frank de Blaker

Starting his career at 18, de Blaker became the best referee in Belgium 7 times. He has worked at two World Championships 2006 and 2010 and Euro 2008. In ordinary life, de Blaker is a manager in a company producing doors and stairs. He speaks Dutch, English, French, German, and is fond of golf.

Lubos Michel

Slovak referee Lubos Michel is the only referee who changed his mind by canceling the second yellow card in the quarter-finals of Euro 2008. There were 4 major tournaments in Michel’s career.

At 40, he finished his work because of health problems, although he could have been the chief referee for another 4 years. Now he owns a tire factory and works in the Slovak Parliament. Michel speaks Slovak, English, Russian, Czech and Polish, and understands Croatian.

Kim Milton Nielsen

Kim Milton Nilson participated in 154 national team matches and 54 Champions League matches. He worked at 1996, 2000 and 2004 Euros, as well as at the 1998 and 2002 World Championships. He became infamous after David Beckham’s removal during the 1998 World Cup incident with Diego Simeone. Also, fans decried him for the removal of Wayne Rooney after he applauded Nielsen for showing him the yellow card. Now, he works as a sales manager.