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UEFA Europa League (Photo credit: Wikipedia) UEFA have announced the Match Officials for this Wednesdays Europa league final between Benfica and Chelsea. Clearly there is so little money to be made in the Europa league they have had to cut back on expenses as they have appointed a Dutch team. Of course I am being flippant and well done to the the team. Referee Björn Kuipers Assistant Referee’s Sander van Roekel and Erwin Zeinstra from the Netherlands. Fourth official will be Felix Brych from Germany Additional assistant referees, Pol van Poekel and Richard Liesveld from the Netherlands. Reserve assistant referee – Berry Simons – Björn Kuipers took charge of the 2011 UEFA Super Cup game in Monaco between FC Barcelona and FC Porto and...

As games are coming up, I expect there to be more blog posts since there is more to talk about but let’s see what time I have to unload them all! Road trip at the start of the week and a long one considering it was the first time on my own. Why you ask? To meet an Aussie! He had my… adidas 2014 kits of course. With the season ramping up and the latest World Cup around, I had to update my kit. The kits felt much lighter than the 2010 counterpart and so more comfortable. Only time will tell if that is indeed the case. My primary pair of adidas mundial team shoes which I use on grass had been looking worse for wear so I gave it a bit of a cleaning and in-sole replacement. I have found that other than colour fading, the in-soles have...

A new section has started on the Dutch Referee Blog: Life after refereeing. This is how I got the idea: Two weeks ago I got an e-mail from a retired Romanian referee, named Daniel Munteanu. He was an international referee and had officiated with René Temmink, a Dutch referee. ‘Got his e-mail address?’, he asked. I know some refs but not all of them. Little research finally got me in touch with a car dealer with the same name. And yes, it was him. Doing this, I wondered why I shouldn’t let these former referees talk about their refereeing experiences. They both agreed to answer the four questions to give an impression of what they do now and what they did before. Today I’ll publish the first part with the Romanian referee. Munteanu at...