First ever female officials at the AFC Asian Cup
At the AFC Asian Cup, which will be hosted in Qatar in January–February 2024, women will officiate for the first time ever.
Yoshimi Yamashita of Japan will be in charge of the group of five female match officials designated for Asia’s most important men’s national team tournament. Yoshimi is one of six historically chosen female referees for the 2022 FIFA World Cup.
At the same time, the most seasoned male officials are Abdulrahman Al-Jassim of Qatar, who handled the 2022 World Cup third-place playoff between Croatia and Morocco, and Alireza Faghani, who will be refereeing in his third AFC Asian Cup.
The event, which is slated to take place across nine sites from 12 January to 10 February 2024, has hired a record-breaking 74 match officials.
From the 18 member organizations, a total of 35 referees and 39 assistant referees, plus two standby candidates for each post, have been chosen.
In Qatar, the Video Assistant Referee (VAR) system will make its complete debut after being successfully used in the United Arab Emirates during the previous edition up to the quarterfinal round.
Before all selected match officials convene in Qatar for a seven-day pre-competition training, the chosen referees will meet in Kuala Lumpur in October for a final session.
