Razeen Gutta
The female referees at this year’s Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (Wafcon) have been lauded for the standard of officiating thus far at the tournament.
As with all good referees, they’ve been so good that you probably haven’t noticed them as they oversee the games.
However, this week they welcomed the media to the Moulay Abdellah Sports Complex where they shared their insights on what officiating has been like in the tournament thus far.
As the competition heads into the knockout stages, CAF (Confederation of African Football) gave the public an opportunity to learn more about the growth of female refereeing on the continent — with referee manager Mamadou Haidara expressing his appreciation of the level of officiating at the tournament.
“There is no match which one can say has been affected by the decisions of the referees. We could see the result of all the work we did before the tournament. It is the result of a development plan that we have put in place,” Haidara said.
“Three months ago, only two women were qualified and used to be a VAR (video assist referee). We did two internships, one in Cairo and one in Rabat, and we managed to qualify all the referees and they are now all comfortable.”
With CAF being one of the first confederations to use VAR in the women’s game, the women with the whistles themselves spoke on their experiences.
“As a woman, it’s first and foremost my competition and that of all women. Even if I officiate in men’s meetings, there are a lot of novelties in this edition,” said assistant referee Carine Atezambon.
“This is the very first time that VAR has been used for this Wafcon and it is the very first time that the refereeing body is mainly made up of women.”
One of the most experienced referees, Bouchra Karboubi, who made history by officiating at the men’s Afcon earlier this year, spoke about how far women’s refereeing has come.
“It is wonderful to see women referees officiating in the matches of a competition of this magnitude,” she said.
“There are some men who are present on VAR duty and we help each other in the most beautiful way, but the vast majority of referees here are ladies. We have received the promise that at the next competition it will be exclusively women on the whistles.”
All the women officiating in Morocco have aspirations to follow in the footsteps of Rwandan Salima Mukansanga who is set to officiate at the Qatar World Cup later this year.
She is one of three female referees who have been selected to potentially officiate a game at the showpiece.
Image source: @CAFOnline
