The excellent Swiss referee Massimo Busacca will be at St James’ Park on Thursday night to take charge of our UEFA Cup Round of 16 1st Leg clash against AZ Alkmaar of the Netherlands. Busacca took charge of 3 matches at the World Cup in Germany last summer: Spain’s 4-0 victory over Ukraine and England’s 2-2 draw with Sweden (both in the Group Stage), and Argentina’s 2-1 extra time victory over Mexico in the second round. Busacca, 38 and fluent in 5 languages, is a Managing Director from Monte Carasso in the Italian speaking area of Switzerland.

Having delved into the archives and looked back across the mists of time (well, about the last 10 years), I have only been able to find 1 other Newcastle match refereed by an official from Switzerland. The man in question was the infamous (and now retired) Urs Meier, who chalked off a potential winning goal for England in the last seconds of the Quarter Final of Euro 2004 against tournament hosts Portugal, who went on to win on penalties.

The game was the second leg of our Champions League qualifier in 1997, against Croatia Zagreb in that city’s Maksimir Stadium. We were 2-1 up from the first leg thanks to 2 goals from the unlikely source of John Beresford, and strengthened that advantage when Jon Dahl Tomasson was fouled by Juric, who received his marching orders, with Tino Asprilla converting the resultant penalty kick. However, we allowed the Croatians back into it, and they forced extra time with an injury time goal from Igor Cvitanovic. What happened next is well documented, as Asprilla’s through ball found Temuri Ketsbaia who fired home in the 120th minute to save us from the dreaded penalty shoot-out, and win us a Champions League place.

Busacca will be assisted by Matthias Arnet and Francesco Buragina, while his fourth official will be Claudio Circhetta, with all 3 of them also coming from Switzerland.