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retirement

Honourably discharged

by Martin Rødvand on December 14, 2009

With the new year approaching, UEFA will be revising their referee categories. Most notably we have a few referees who’s reached the retirement age of 45 and will be forced to retire from international duties.

Below I have listed all the retiring referees (from age), all from the list previously published. In the new list, published some time in January/February we should expect to see some promotions to the Elite category, and perhaps some new referees in the category 3/4.

Elite category
Konrad Plautz, Austria
Iouri Baskakov, Russia
Michael Riley, England
Bertrand Layec, France (comment)

Premier category
Paul Allaerts, Belgium
Costas Kapitanis, Cyprus
Nikolay Ivanov, Russia
Vladimir Hrinak, Slovakia

Category 2
Jouni Hyytia, Finland

Category 3
Karen Nalbandyan, Armenia
Stefan Messner, Austria
Anthony Zammit, Malta
Paulo Manuel Gomes Costa, Portugal

A few trivial facts about the most prominent retiring referees:

  • Konrad Plautz participated in EURO 2008.
  • Michael Riley participated in EURO 2004.
  • Vladimir Hrinak was fourth official in the 2008 final between Manchester Utd and Chelsea, a match Lubos Michel refereed.

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Rob Styles retires

by Martin Rødvand on June 13, 2009

And another one bites the dust.

Rob Styles, the 45-year-old Englishman, has according to Graham Poll’s column decided to retire early from the Premier League. Styles has been involved in various controversies in the Premiership the last couple of years and it’s been 18 months since he last had a ‘top game’.

The category 2 referee has been on the FIFA list since 2002 and he’s done various UEFA Cup matches and a couple of Champions League qualifiers. He reached his peak in 2005 when he was appointed to the FA Cup final between Arsenal and Manchester United, a match which ended 5-4 after penalties. Styles handed out seven yellow with one resulting in Jose Antonio Reyes’ second and therefore red card.

He was promoted to the Premier League in front of the 2000 season.

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Herbert Fandel retires

June 8, 2009

Herbert Fandel, the 45-year-old German referee, has announced his retirement from football. The Elite group referee who refereed the UEFA Cup final in 2006 and the UEFA Champions League final in 2007 last refereed an international match in December 2008, with AS Roma and Bordeaux in the Champions League. He was later injured and missed [...]

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