The decision was communicated to the Argentine Football Association (AFA) and the National Arbitration Directorate, and places Argentina, together with Brazil, as the countries with the highest number of main referees in the tournament.
The refereeing team is completed by assistants Juan Pablo Belatti, Maximiliano Del Yesso, Gabriel Chade, Facundo Rodríguez and Cristian Navarro, while Hernán Mastrangelo will be in charge of the VAR.
For Falcón Pérez and Herrera it will be their debut in a World Cup at the national level, although the first one already has international experience after having directed the 2025 Club World Cup. Instead, Tello will once again be present at a world cup event after his participation in Qatar 2022, where he refereed three matches (Switzerland - Cameroon and Portugal - South Korea in the group stage and Morocco - Portugal in the quarterfinals
). Tello will have his second World Cup as head referee
In total, Argentina will have nine arbitration representatives in the contest: three field judges, five assistants and a member of the VAR. The appointment, which will be made official by FIFA in the next few hours, marks a milestone for national refereeing and reinforces its weight on the
international scene.
The concern that Tello would be under control
A few days ago, Facundo Tello set off the alarms after suffering knee discomfort during the final of theintercontinental repechage between the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Jamaica.
The 43-year-old judge had to leave the field in full overtime, visibly affected and tearfully, and was replaced by Darío Herrera, who was serving as fourth referee
. Tello was injured in overtime between Democratic Republic of Congo and Jamaica
The situation generated uncertainty regarding his presence in the 2026 World Cup, although encouraging signs emerged over the course of the hours: the first evaluations indicate that the injury would not be serious, so he would not be ruled out for the appointment in the United States, Mexico
