Two Scottish female FIFA referees have achieved Guinness World Record status after officiating at the highest-ever football match at the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro. Morag Pirie and Vicki Allan were part of a team of match officials who refereed a 90-minute women’s match between Volcano FC and Glacier FC, as part of an Equal Playing Fields initiative. A total of 37 players representing 20 nationalities completed an 11-a-side match at 5729 metres – an altitude never attempted before. After a rigorous training regime, the group scaled the Tanzanian mountain with a team of medics over a seven-day period. They used flour to mark the pitch and trekking poles as corner flags with the fixture taking place on a volcanic ash pitch. The match may have ended in a 0-0 draw, but the group achieved their goal of highlighting the inequality women face in sport.
Referee Morag Pirie said: “I’m hugely proud to have been a part of the climb – it was an absolutely amazing experience. I only had three weeks’ notice that I was going whereas some of the other participants had known for over a year. I missed the vast majority of the 12-week training programme but I think my referee training helped and I climbed a number of hills close to where I live to help prepare. It was hugely challenging – even things like tying my shoelaces was difficult at that altitude. We warmed up for the match by simply walking around the pitch because it was so hard to breath. It’s something few people have achieved and everyone is proud to have played their part – there was a real sense of achievement and relief at the end of the match. As a female referee in a male-dominated sport, I can understand where Equal Playing Fields are coming from and what they are trying to achieve. I was more than willing to help their cause and I hope it can help make a difference to women and girls around the world.” They were joined by former FIFA referee Jacqui Hurford from Australia. “The playing field isn’t equal, so we wanted to highlight the issues and get people thinking about women’s sport,” she said. “Women in sport just want to be treated the same as men do. Many people think of women in sport, as butch lesbians, but that’s absolutely not the case.” Hurford has refereed some of the biggest games in the sport, including the 2011 Women’s World Cup quarter-final between the USA and Brazil. She retired as a FIFA referee in 2013 and since then she has be an instructor, assessor and recruiter for the Asian Football Confederation and the Football Federation Australia. The 38-year-old’s role with the Equal Playing Field project was to source FIFA officials and to ensure the game meets the Guinness World Record criteria.