The country's soccer team will meet its Round of 12 opponents Oman in the 5th round and Australia in the 6th round at home on November 11 and 16 respectively. The AFC has recently confirmed the refereeing arrangements for these two rounds. It is reported that if all goes well, Thai referee Sivakorn Buudong and Jordanian referee Mahadmeh Adham Mohammed Touma will referee the two key matches for our team respectively. Both referees have rich experience in refereeing against our team and have even been invited to China to referee the Chinese Super League. For example, our striker Wu Lei's first red card in the Chinese Super League was issued by Mahdameh, so our team is more familiar with the style of these two referees internally.
The AFC traditionally announces the list of referees about three weeks before each round of matches in the Top 12. Although as of the evening of October 22, our team has not yet determined whether it will be able to hold these two home matches of the Top 12 tournament in China, the AFC has already determined the referees for our matches against Oman and Australia in advance in order to ensure the fairness of the matches. In the 5th round home match against Oman held on Nov. 11, Thai referee Sivakorn Buudong will be the referee, and his assistant referees are Thailand's Nakkalit Rawut and Singapore's Kuya Lonnie. And in the Round 6 home match against Australia on Nov. 16, 35-year-old Jordanian referee Mahadmeh Adham Mohammed Touma will officiate, with his assistant referees also from Jordan. In fact, both Sivagong and Mahadmeh are "old faces" to the soccer world in China. Sivakoon has been to China many times to enforce the law, while Mahadmeh has had many encounters with our players, including enforcing our team against Iran in the last 12-team tournament, as well as Wu Lei's first red card in the 2013 Chinese Super League. Mahademeh has not only enforced our national team's matches, but also a number of international matches, including the 2017 AFC Champions League 1/8 final match between Guangzhou Evergrande at home and Japan's Kashima Antlers. Most of the current international players of our team have participated in the international matches enforced by him. In the face of such an "old friend", our team will further understand the characteristics of the referee through image data and other information during the preparation period, so as to ensure that the rules are followed and penalties are respected during the game, and to avoid non-combatant attrition due to refereeing problems.
