Maria Piedade Rebello is an Indian former footballer and professional

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

referee A referee is an official, in a variety of sports and competition, responsible for enforcing the rules of the sport, including sportsmanship decisions such as ejection. The official tasked with this job may be known by a variety of other title ...

who officiates primarily in the

I-League The I-League is the men's second professional football division of the Indian football league system behind the Indian Super League. Administered by the All India Football Federation, it is currently contested by 13 clubs. It operates as a s ...

, having been appointed to the list of I-League referees before the 2013–14 season, and has been a

FIFA listed The FIFA International Referees List is an annual publication of the global list of FIFA international referees in the football-variants controlled by FIFA association football (outdoor football), futsal and beach soccer Beach soccer, also k ...

referee since 2011. Rebello is the only FIFA-listed women's referee from India. She is also the former captain of the India women's football team.

Early life and footballing career

Born in

Curtorim Curtorim is a town in the Salcette taluka of South Goa district in Goa, India.It comes under Margao metropolitan region. Curtorim, a verdant agrarian village, known as the "granary of Salcete", is said to have got its name from either ' or ' sin ...

Goa Goa (; ; ) is a state on the southwestern coast of India within the Konkan region, geographically separated from the Deccan highlands by the Western Ghats. It is bound by the Indian states of Maharashtra to the north, and Karnataka to the ...

, Rebello started to play football from a young age with the local boys. She then played competitive football for her school side on less than satisfactory fields with makeshift goals which she said made her "rough and tough" and thus made it easier for her to become a footballer. She then went on to captain the India women's team in the

2001 AFC Women's Championship The 2001 AFC Women's Championship was a women's football tournament held in Taipei County, Taiwan (Chinese Taipei) between 4 and 16 December 2001. It was the 13th staging of the AFC Women's Asian Cup, consisting of fourteen teams. Teams * * * ...

in which India finished second-to-last in their group. She then retired early from the game.

Refereeing career

After retiring from playing football, Rebello joined the Bombay Referees Association where she trained to become a referee. She then joined the

Goa Football Association The Goa Football Association ( GFA) is the governing body of association football, football in Goa. It is affiliated with the All India Football Federation, the national governing body. It sends state teams for Santosh Trophy and Senior Women's ...

and refereed matches for men in the local leagues. Eventually she managed to referee matches in the

Goa Professional League The Goa Football League is a ladder-based football competition in the Indian state of Goa, organised by the Goa Football Association as part of the state leagues. It was formed in 1951 as the Goa Primeira Divisão or Goa First Division, and ...

, the top football league in

. She also refereed matches in the

SAFF Championship The SAFF Championship (erstwhile SAARC Gold Cup and SAFF Gold Cup), is the primary association football competition contested by the senior List of men's national association football teams, men's national teams of the South Asian Football Fede ...

. She has also managed to referee matches at the professional and semi-professional club level in men's football in India by officiating matches in the Federation Cup and

Santosh Trophy The National Football Championship for Santosh Trophy, or simply Santosh Trophy, is an inter-state national football competition contested by the state associations and government institutions under the All India Football Federation (AIFF), th ...

I-League

Rebello was then confirmed to be one of the referees on the list of referees for the 2013–14 season on 22 July 2013. She officiated her first I-League match on 8 March 2014 between

Pune Pune ( ; , ISO 15919, ISO: ), previously spelled in English as Poona (List of renamed Indian cities and states#Maharashtra, the official name until 1978), is a city in the state of Maharashtra in the Deccan Plateau, Deccan plateau in Western ...

and

Shillong Lajong Shillong Lajong Football Club (founded as Lajong SC) is an Indian professional football club based in Shillong, Meghalaya. The club is currently competing in the I-League, the second tier of the Indian football league system, following promotio ...

. She gave four yellow cards out that match as the match ended 2–2.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rebello, Maria Living people Sportspeople from South Goa district Indian women's footballers India women's international footballers Indian football referees Footballers from Goa Sportswomen from Goa Women's association football players not categorized by position Year of birth missing (living people) Footballers at the 1998 Asian Games Asian Games competitors for India Women referees and umpires