1 week Ago By [email protected] (James Quinlan)
Referee Michael Oliver has taken charge of several Liverpool matches during the 2024/25 season. Michael Oliver has been confirmed as one of the two referees from the Premier League that will officiate at the revamped FIFA Club World Cup this summer. That announcement, though, comes with one or two controversial moments involving Liverpool still fresh in the mind.
"We are coming from high standard performances delivered during the last FIFA tournaments. So the bar is higher," chairman of FIFA 's referees committee, Pierluigi Collina, said alongside Monday's statement confirming English officials Oliver and Anthony Taylor for the upcoming tournament. They are two of 117 individuals to be drafted from 41 member nations.
Incidentally, with one or two raised eyebrows from a Liverpool perspective, from the nine matches in which Arne Slot 's side have dropped points this season, Oliver has been in charge of three of them. They were the defeat to Nottingham Forest and draw to Manchester United, both at Anfield , plus the last-gasp away draw to Everton in the last ever Merseyside derby at Goodison Park. It was the Reds' showdown with their neighbours that attracted the most controversial attention , because of the officiating on display.
The Blues were first able to take an early lead from a free-kick routine, even though it looked as though Iliman Ndiaye drew no contact from Alexis Mac Allister before going to ground. Liverpool had battled back through Mac Allister and Mohamed Salah to lead 2-1, although as the clock passed the allotted five added minutes, Oliver then elected to play on. James Tarkowski's equaliser came in the eighth-minute of stoppage time and survived a VAR check for offside and a push by Beto on Ibrahima Konate.
Tensions boiled over between the two sets of players after the final whistle; resulting in Curtis Jones, Abdoulaye Doucoure, Liverpool head coach Slot and his assistant, Sipke Hulshoff, being shown a red card by Oliver. As fans may remember, this was a game-in-hand on Premier League title rivals Arsenal, with the Reds being able to move nine points clear at the time. In hindsight, it did not have too much of an impact as Liverpool sit 13 points clear; six shy of mathematically being confirmed as Premier League champions.
Still, referee Oliver is yet to be selected by the Professional Game Match Officials Board Limited (PGMOL) for involvement in a Reds' match - in any capacity - since then. The Northumberland-based 40-year-old has also been in the 'bad books' of the Gunners having sent off defender Myles Lewis-Skelly against Wolves for violent in January. His punishment was rescinded, and Oliver taken off duty the week after for their following match vs Manchester City.
Despite these contested moments in hugely-important matches, he's now been selected as one of England's best examples and will embark on this next task this summer at a tournament worth a total prize fund of £775m..
