István Kovács (referee)

István Kovács (born 16 September 1984) is a Romanian football referee of Hungarian ethnicity, who primarily officiates in the Liga I. He has been a full international for FIFA since 2018, and a UEFA elite referee since 2019.

Kovács is part of the Hungarian minority in Romania, and is also part-German through his maternal side. He concomitant holds both a Romanian and a Hungarian passport His younger brother, Szabolcs, is also a referee in the Liga I.

He was born in Carei, Satu Mare County, and currently resides in Cluj-Napoca. In early 2023, after his overall good performance in his refereeing career, he became a Honorary Citizen of Carei.

Career and notable events
Kovács was one of the two Romanian referees, the other one being Ovidiu Hațegan, selected for UEFA Euro 2020. He was in charge of one group stage game, the Group D fixture between the Netherlands and North Macedonia on June 21, 2021 in Amsterdam, which ended in a 3-0 victory for the Dutch.

On April 26, 2022, he officiated the first leg of the UEFA Champions League semi-final between Manchester City and Real Madrid in Manchester, which the Citizens won 4-3. Because of the good performance, Kovács was praised by the media, especially for the advantage let before Bernardo Silva's goal. As a reward for his overall good performance, the UEFA Referees Committee chose him to officiate the 2022 UEFA Europa Conference League final.

The final took place in Tirana on May 25 of the same year, and Kovács was in charge of the match between A.S. Roma and Feyenoord, the first final in this competition. The Italians won the final in Albania 1-0 and became the first title holders of the UEFA Europa Conference League.

The same year, István Kovács was appointed for the 2022 FIFA World Cup, along with his compatriot assistant referees Vasile Marinescu and Mihai Artene. He didn't got to be the referee for any match despite being the fourth official in eight fixtures.

On January 19 the following year, he refereed the final of the 25th Arabian Gulf Cup, disputed between Iraq and Oman. The same month, he was one of six match officials appointed for the 2022 FIFA Club World Cup in Morocco. On February 7, he oversaw the semi-final between Brazilian side Flamengo and Saudi Arabian side Al Hilal, which Al Hilal won 3-2.

In June 2023, Kovács was appointed as the fourth official for the UEFA Champions League final between Manchester City and Inter Milan, which the Citizens won 1-0.

In 2024, he was selected by UEFA to referee UEFA Europa League Final between Atalanta and Bayer Leverkusen, which took place on May 22 on Aviva Stadium in Dublin. Atalanta won the match 3-0 and stopped Leverkusen's record-break winning streak.

As expected, he was picked for UEFA Euro 2024, where he officiated two group stage fixtures, between Slovenia and Serbia on June 20, and between Czech Republic and Turkey, in which he handed out sixteen yellow cards and two red ones, breaking the European Championship record for the most cautions among both teams in a single match. By sending off Czech Republic's Antonín Barák only 20 minutes into the match, he also broke the record for the fastest red card in the history of the European Championship. He also sent off another Czech player, Tomáš Chorý.