Ismail Elfath
Ismail Elfath (Arabic اسماعيل الفتح, born March 3, 1982) is a Moroccan-born American soccer referee for the Professional Referee Organization. He has been a referee in Major League Soccer since 2012 and a FIFA listed referee since 2016.
Contents
- 1 Early life
- 2 Career
- 3 References
- 4 External links
Early life
Born in Casablanca, Morocco, Elfath moved to the United States when he was eighteen.
Career
Elfath was first a Fourth official in MLS in 2011 and made his MLS refereeing debut in 2012. Elfath became a FIFA listed official in 2016.
Elfath was the referee during an August 2016 match between New York Red Bulls II and Orlando City B where the worldwide first on-field Video *istant Referee review took place as the system was being tested in USL.
On March 26, 2019, Elfath was selected to referee the 2019 FIFA U-20 World Cup in Poland. Elfath along with American *istant referees Corey Parker and Kyle Atkins was selected by FIFA to officiate the final of the tournament, which Ukraine won 2-1 over South Korea.
On May 17, 2019, Elfath was appointed to officiate in the 2019 CONCACAF Gold Cup in the United States following his participation in the 2019 FIFA U-20 World Cup.
Later that year Elfath took charge of the semi-final match at the FIFA Qatar 2019 Club World Cup.
On November 18, 2020, Elfath was named the MLS Referee of the Year for the first time in his career.
In July 2021, Elfath took charge of three matches at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, including a quarter -final match between host nation *an and New Zealand.
Elfath was chosen as one of the two referees from CONCACAF for the 2021 Africa Cup of Nations held in Cameroon from 9 January to 6 February 2022.
References
https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2020/11/19/ismail-elfath-named-mls-referee-year
External links
- Ismail Elfath at the Professional Referee Organization (archive)