England’s Rebecca Welch has been named amongst selected match officials for 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup.
Welch who is yet to dish out a red card this season has been selected amongst 33 referees to take charge of various matches at the Women’s World Cup this summer in Australia and New Zealand, which takes place between 20 July – 20 August.
Welch however won’t be alone in heading Down Under because her fellow match officials, Natalie Aspinall and Sian Massey-Ellis have also been called up in respective Assistant Referee and Video Match Official roles.
Wales’ Cheryl Foster meanwhile becomes the first Welsh referee to be called up for a World Cup since Clive Thomas at 1978 FIFA Men’s World Cup, with the announcement coming off the back of a strong 2022 where she took charge of three UEFA Women’s Euro matches.
Speaking about her appointment to the Women’s World Cup refereeing rosster, Foster commented: “I am honoured that I have been given the opportunity to represent my country refereeing at the World Cup this summer.
“In the last 10 years I’ve put a lot of hard work and commitment in, and this is what I have been working towards. I’m looking forward to officiating the best players on the world stage.”
FA Wales Match Officials Manager, Lee Evans described Foster’s “historic” call-up as “absolutely fantastic news,” for Welsh refereeing and iterated that he is “extremely proud” of her achievements, as he described this appointment as proof of “what hard work and dedication can bring.”
FIFA Referees Committee chairman, Pierluigi Collina meanwhile has issued a statement explaining that the selected match officials were judged primarily on “quality first” criteria, in order to ensure that they “represent the highest level of refereeing worldwide,” available.
Collina also reflected on a “very successful” Women’s World Cup in 2019 as he praised “high standard of refereeing” as having played a huge role, despite China’s Qin Liang causing controversy during England’s Round of 16 win over Cameroon.
Liang though won’t play any part in this tournament after she was snubbed from FIFA’s match official selection.
Collina therefore is eager to see further progress as he said: “The aim for the FIFA Women’s World Cup Australia & New Zealand 2023 is to repeat that success and to convince again with excellent referees’ performances.”
FIFA’s Head of Women Refereeing, Kari Seitz added that the process to determine the match official selection began in 2020, amidst the Coronavirus pandemic making ‘in-presence’ analysis of referees very difficult due to a strict lengthy suspension of that aspect of the criteria reviewing
FIFA consequently deployed various new referee development programmes including a “Tracking & Support programme,” which saw refereeing candidates assigned a FIFA coach who reviewed their refereeing performances on a monthly basis.
Seitz though has iterated that the “Tracking & Support programme,” will remain in place to support selected match officials with their final preparations for the tournament.
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