The fourth edition of the Australian-Italian referee exchange program will take shape this weekend with officials from Italy taking charge of various IGA NPL NSW Mens 1 and SUPA IGA NPL NSW Mens 2 matches.

The Italian delegation will consist of three referees and five executives from FIGC and AIA.  

They are:

• Giuseppe Repace, Enrico Guerra, Luca Zucchetti – Referees                             
• Luigi Repace - President of the National Regional Football League Umbria and Federal Consigliere to FIGC Roma
• Luca Fiorucci - President of the National Regional Referees Umbria
• Renzo Boccali  - Committee member of the National Regional Referees Umbria
• Alessandro Apruzzese – Media manager and AIA Sports writer for the region of Umbria and Matteo Donato – Responsible for events 

Giuseppe Repace will have the honour of refereeing the round 7 IGA NPL NSW Mens 1 clash between the APIA Leichhardt Tigers and Rockdale City Suns this Saturday at Lambert Park while Luca Zucchetti will officiate the Grade 20s clash.

The following day will see Enrico Guerra take charge of the Blacktown City FC v Sydney Olympic match to be held at Lily’s Football Centre.

Week two of their program will see Luca officiate the SUPA IGA NPL NSW Mens 2 match between Sydney University v Northern Tigers while Giuseppe will officiate the Hills Brumbies v Central Coast Mariners Academy match. Finally, Enrico will look after the Parramatta FC v Mounties Wanderers clash which will conclude their refereeing duties in Australia.

Robert Colombo President of the NSW State League Football Referees, Sandro Perticarini Management Committee Member and Wayne Spagnol from the referees apparel supplier Unipro greeted the Italian delegation on Thursday at Kingsford Smith Airport.

Robert, Sandro and Wayne are primarily responsible in looking after the exchange schedule and ensuring that everything goes to plan.

“As in the past three exchange programs 2004, 2006 and 2009 and in keeping with tradition the Italians will referee over two weekends.  This year’s program was made possible with the collaboration of Football NSW and the NSW State League Football Referees Inc.  Club Marconi, APIA Leichhardt Tigers and the Bankstown Sports Club also played a pivotal role by supporting this wonderful initiative."

“The reciprocal exchange program will see three Australian referees from the NSW State League Referees Inc selected on performance to ply their profession in Italy around September this year.  Apart from football and refereeing the exchange program provides a continuation in experiencing different cultures, sharing administration ideas and an insight on new techniques to benefit overall the game we love so much.”

One such referee that has benefited from this exchange program was none other than Football NSW Referees Manager and current Hyundai A-League referee Kris Griffiths-Jones.  Jones was part of the 2006 program that saw him travel to Italy in what was a good experience for the whistleblower.