Antonio Conde, Julio Anaya and Wojciech Liska. This was the refereeing trio for the Olympic final between France and the United States on Saturday evening. While it is always positive not to talk too much about a referee after a match, we should not forget them either. One thing is certain, the first-mentioned will not forget this great moment in his career. The Spaniard had previously refereed the match between Team USA and Brazil in the quarter-finals, as well as the semi-final between Les Bleus and Germany.
“The Olympic Games are always magical. I did the Tokyo Games without the fans, I fought to be there and I loved it,” Antonio Conde confides to Brand. “Stephen Curry's three-pointer over Victor Wembanyama was spectacular. They are unique players. They don't give you a second to think.”
Particularly impressed by the performances of LeBron James at almost 40 years old and by Curry – “What I remember from the Games” he said – it took the referee a few days to grasp the significance of his Saturday night, after that memorable match.
“At the moment, the first thing to do is to work as if it were a match like any other. It's now, when the days have passed, that we remember the match and we get goosebumps.”he says.
This first Olympic final is a sort of culmination for Antonio Conde, after two decades of career, notably in Spain, with a whistle in his mouth. “If someone had told me I would achieve all that, I would have thought they were crazy. I couldn't imagine achieving a tenth of that when I started refereeing.”the referee concluded.
