Marciniak reveals World Cup semi-final plan changed

Szymon Marciniak has revealed he was being lined up to referee a World Cup semi-final before FIFA altered its plans, with the Polish official saying the eventual decision was influenced by the teams involved and the wider optics around the appointment.

Marciniak says he was in the semi-final rotation

Speaking on Kanal Sportowy, Marciniak said he had been placed in the usual referee rotation that often signals a major appointment is approaching. He explained that he and his team were waiting for confirmation, aware that officials in that position are typically assigned a match within the next few days.

The referee from Płock said he had no complaints about the process or the people making the decisions. He stressed his respect for Pierluigi Collina and Massimo Busacca, adding that he remained loyal to the group and had no intention of criticising those in charge of appointments.

Marciniak then disclosed that the match he had been prepared for was a semi-final. According to his account, he had already spent two days in the rotation, which led many around him to believe he would take charge of one of the last four ties of the tournament.

Why the appointment did not happen

Marciniak said the situation turned against him because of the teams that progressed. He pointed to France, who had lost the previous World Cup final with him as referee, and Argentina, another side central to the discussion around his possible appointment.

In his view, FIFA considered the public relations and marketing consequences of assigning him again to a match involving Argentina. He suggested that if Marciniak had overseen another Argentina game and the same team had gone on to win, the reaction could have been difficult for the governing body to manage.

That concern appears to have been heightened by the fallout from Argentina's match against Algeria, one of only two games Marciniak refereed at the tournament. During that game, he did not show Lionel Messi a card for a foul on Aissa Mandi, a decision that sparked significant media debate.

Messi incident added to the scrutiny

Marciniak maintained that his call in the Argentina-Algeria match was correct. He also said his superiors did not raise objections to the decision itself. Even so, the controversy around the incident seems to have contributed to a more cautious approach when FIFA weighed up later appointments.

Rather than risk another storm around an Argentina match, those responsible for referee selections chose a different path. Marciniak's explanation suggests the issue was not a loss of confidence in his ability, but a judgment about the broader context surrounding the tournament's biggest fixtures.

• Marciniak said he was being prepared for a World Cup semi-final.
• He worked only two matches at the tournament: Argentina v Algeria and Egypt v Iran.
• He said the teams involved affected FIFA's final decision.
• He also referenced the controversy after not booking Lionel Messi against Algeria.

No public grievance from the Polish referee

Despite the disappointment, Marciniak said he accepted the outcome with humility. He described himself as being close to a third major assignment and acknowledged that referee appointments at a tournament can depend heavily on which teams advance and the narratives that build around them.

For a referee still widely regarded as one of the leading officials in the game, the sense of what might have been is clear. But Marciniak's own account was measured rather than bitter: he felt he had been trusted, understood the reasoning that was presented to him, and accepted that the final stages of a World Cup are shaped by more than refereeing form alone.