Letexier abandoned by peers after controversial Argentina-Egypt refereeing

François Letexier faced more than just the anger of the Egyptian Football Association: several former international referees have in turn questioned his management of the 2026 World Cup round-of-16 between Argentina and Egypt (3-2), a match that the Albiceleste overturned after trailing 2-0 with a quarter of an hour remaining.

The turning point of the match crystallizes the criticism: the 2-0 goal disallowed to Mostafa Zico following VAR intervention for a foul far upstream of the action. For former Premier League referee Graham Scott, this decision constitutes a “stunning overreach” of protocol. He recalls that video is only meant to correct “clear and obvious” errors: seeking out a micro-contact at the origin of an action lasting 18 seconds, during which Argentina had at least four opportunities to stop play and covered more than 100 metres, far exceeds this framework according to him. Scott believes this excessive severity created a decisive psychological imbalance for the rest of the match.

Mark Clattenburg, referee of the Euro 2016 final, points to a glaring lack of consistency between the two penalty areas. If Letexier applied the rules with extreme rigour to disallow the Egyptian goal, he conversely let pass without comment a contact on Mohamed Salah in the Argentine penalty area, then a push on Hamdy Fathy just before Enzo Fernández’s third goal. For Clattenburg, this “double standard” is enough to destroy the credibility of the entire performance.

Tony Chapron shares this assessment and goes further on the responsibility of the video team. “Since the start of the World Cup, fouls like that, I’ve seen 1000 of them. They weren’t called. Once you’re in front of the images, you’re stuck and you’re forced to say there’s a foul. Objectively, there is a foul. But in the context of the match and the tournament, you absolutely should not have called it,” said the former French referee. For him, VAR should never have intervened on such an action.

The Egyptian Football Association has officially lodged a complaint with FIFA and demanded Letexier’s exclusion from the competition for “double standard” and “discrimination”. FIFA has not yet made its response public.