Accra, June 6, GNA - FIFA's Referee Committee on Saturday assigned Ravshan Irmatov from the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) as referee for the opening match between South Africa and Mexico at the 2010 FIFA World Cup South AfricaT to be held in Johannesburg Soccer City at 16:00.

Ravshan Irmatov, with an international career dating back to 2003, is the only Uzbek referee to have officiated in the finals of a FIFA tournament to date. He is currently rated as AFC Referee of the Year and he received this award for the two prior years, 2009 and 2008.

Information gathered by GNA Sports from the FIFA Media Channel said the referee has appeared three times at the FIFA U-17 World Cup (2003, 2007 and 2009), once at the FIFA U-20 World Cup and also at the FIFA Club World Cup Japan 2008, where he not only handled the quarter-final match meeting of Al Ahly and Pachuca, but also took charge of the Liga de Quito-Manchester United final.

Ravshan Irmatov's record in the top Asian tournaments includes a debut in the AFC Champions League in 2003 and in 2007 he officiated the Final of this tournament held in Japan, one of his biggest achievements to date. He was also selected for the AFC Asian Cup in 2004 and directed eight Asian preliminary matches for the 2010 FIFA World Cup South AfricaT. Rafael Ilyasov from Uzbekistan and Bahadyr Kochkorov from Kyrgyzstan will be the assistant referees for the opening game. The fourth official will be Subkhiddin Mohd Salleh from Malaysia. 06 June 10