Michael Oliver Referee Biography
Michael Oliver is an English football referee. He is an official Premier League referee and is among the members of the Select Group of Referees in England. He is from Ashington, Northumberland hence his county FA is the Northumberland Football Association. In 2012, Oliver received his FIFA badge and this has allowed him to officiate in major international matches.
In 2015, he was appointed to take charge of the final of the FIFA U-17 World Cup while in 2018, he was promoted to the UEFA Elite Group of Referees.
Michael Oliver Age | How Old is Michael Oliver
The Premier League referee is 34 years old as of 2019. He was born on 20 February 1985 in Ashington, United Kingdom.
Michael Oliver Family – Parents
Oliver was born in Ashington to Clive Oliver and an unknown mother. Nothing much is known about the family only that it was Michael’s father who introduced him to refereeing when he was 14.
Michael Oliver Wife
Michael is married to Lucy Oliver since June 2015. She is also a referee, a Level 3 referee and FA qualified who was a college lecturer. She officiates in the Women’s Super League and men’s non-league matches. They settled down in Morpeth, Northumberland.
Michael Oliver’s Photo
Referee Michael Oliver
After being introduced to refereeing by his father, Michael rose quickly up the ranks and in 2007, he got promoted to the National List of Referees. In the same year, he got to ref the 2007 Conference National play-off final to become the youngest football referee to officiate at Wembley Stadium.
Michael had also been the youngest Football League assistant referee, youngest Football League referee, and was set to become the youngest fourth official in the Premier League.
In 2000, Michael’s father, Clive, refereed the 2009 League Two play-off final while his son officiated the next day’s match, the 2009 League One play-off final. He would have become the youngest referee in the Premier League in January 2010 as he was set to referee a match between Portsmouth and Fulham. Bad weather however led to the postponement of the match and an ankle operation led to him being sidelined until April.
In August 2010, Michael broke Stuart Attwell’s record as the youngest-ever Premier League referee after he was promoted to the Select Group. His first match was between Birmingham City against Blackburn Rovers at the age of 25 years and 182 days old. For the 2013 League Cup final at the Wembley Stadium, Michael was appointed as the fourth official.
In April 2013, Oliver refereed the FA Cup semi-final with Wigan Athletic playing against Millwall and this made him the youngest referee to take charge of an FA Cup semi-final. During the 2014 FA Community Shield that was between Manchester City and Arsenal, Michael was the referee and Arsenal won the match 3-0.
He was also involved in the 2016–17 UEFA Champions League as the referee, officiating three group stage matches. He got to ref the second leg of the 2017–18 UEFA Champions League quarter-final that was between Juventus and Real Madrid. Real Madrid emerged as the winners in the first leg with three goals and Juventus had none. This result made it necessary for Juventus to plan for a 3-0 win for the them to have the match get to extra time.
Michael Oliver Buffon
Juventus had a 3-0 lead till when Michael awarded an injury time penalty to Real Madrid at the 93rd minute. This was after Medhi Benatia challenged Lucas Vázquez in the box. Following the penalty award, some of the players from Juventus, led by the captain and goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon, began a confrontation with the referee (Michael). Oliver then pulled out a red card and showed it to Buffon for dissent, with nine yellow cards being issued in the course of the game.
Juventus’ second goalkeeper, Wojciech Szczęsny was substituted in and the penalty kick was converted by Christiano Ronaldo in the 98th minute. The game ended in a 4-3 aggregate win for Real Madrid to advance to the semi-final.
After this particular match, Michael’s wife received threatening and abusive text messages through her mobile number, after posting it on social media. The police began investigations into the case as well as into reports of banging on the front door of their home and abuse through the letter box. On 11th May, UEFA charged Buffon over post-match comments made about Oliver with the UEFA Control, Ethics and Disciplinary Body giving him a three-match ban for UEFA competition matches till June 5th.
Michael Oliver Ref Now – Today
Refereed Matches in the 2018-2019 Season
| Competition | Appearances | Yellow Cards | 2nd Yellow Cards | Red Cards | Penalties |
| UEFA Champions League | 3 | 19 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
| Europa League | 2 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| Europa League Qualifying | 1 | 6 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| UEFA Nations League A | 1 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| Premier League | 23 | 71 | 1 | 4 | 9 |
| FA Cup | 3 | 10 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| EFL Cup | 2 | 8 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
| International Friendlies | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 36 | 130 | 2 | 5 | 12 |
Michael Oliver Referee Stats
| R | Tournament | Apps | Fouls pg | Fouls/Tackles | Pen pg | Yel pg | Yel | Red pg | Red |
| 1 | Premier League | 226 | 22.65 | 0.60 | 0.32 | 3.21 | 726 | 0.15 | 33 |
| 2 | UEFA Europa League | 15 | 28.93 | 0.84 | 0.27 | 3.80 | 57 | 0.20 | 3 |
| 3 | UEFA Champions League | 11 | 29.64 | 0.95 | 0.18 | 4.82 | 53 | 0.27 | 3 |
| 4 | Championship | 5 | 22.40 | 0.62 | 0.40 | 4.00 | 20 | 0.00 | 0 |
| 5 | UEFA Nations League A | 1 | 27.00 | 0.77 | 0.00 | 4.00 | 4 | 0.00 | 0 |
| Total / Average | 258 | 23.33 | 0.63 | 0.31 | 3.33 | 860 | 0.15 | 39 | |
- Fouls pg: Fouls per game
- Fouls/Tackles: Fouls per tackle
- Pen pg: Penalties per game
- Yel pg: Yellow cards per game
- Yel: Total yellow cards
- Red pg: Red cards per game
- Red: Total red cards
Michael Oliver Haircut
Michael Oliver Salary
As of 2017, Oliver earns an annual salary of £65,000 as basic salary. There is also a match fee of £1,150 per game. A referee can make more money when they officiate games in the Champions League, World Cup and European Championship.
Michael Oliver Height
Oliver has a height of 1.8 m.
Michael Oliver Net Worth
Oliver’s actual net worth is not known.
Michael Oliver Twitter
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