Nicole Petignat

Who is Nicole Petignat?

Nicole Petignat is a Swiss former football referee. In August 2003 she became the first female referee of a men's football match organized by UEFA; AIK Fotboll versus Fylkir in the preliminary round of the UEFA Cup.

Petignat passed her youth in the canton of Jura. She started to take courses of arbitration in 1983 and consecutively climbed all the levels leading to the arbitration in the national League A. Petignat is one of only few female referees to work in professional male football with matches in the first Swiss and Austrian Bundesliga league. Altogether, Petignat refereed 91 Swiss first league matches and in May 2007 the final of the Swiss Cup – FC Basel versus FC Lucerne. Her experience was also recognized when she became the first woman to referee a male UEFA Cup tie in 2003.

In July 1999 in Los Angeles she refereed the final of the FIFA Women's World Cup between the United States and China. She controversially failed to penalise American goalkeeper Brianna Scurry for moving forward off her goal-line during the penalty shoot-out.