De Bleeckere takes Super Cup whistle

Belgian referee Frank De Bleeckere will take charge of the UEFA Super Cup match between the UEFA Champions League winners FC Barcelona and the last UEFA Cup winners FC Shakhtar Donetsk at the Stade Louis II in Monaco on Friday.

Belgian team
De Bleeckere will be accompanied by an all-Belgian team. Peter Hermans and Walter Vromans will be the assistant referees, with Paul Allaerts acting as fourth official. De Bleeckere was born in Oudenaarde on 1 July 1966 and became an international referee in 1998. He has over 70 international matches on his refereeing CV. In last season's UEFA Champions League De Bleeckere handled one third qualifying round match, three group stage matches and the second leg between Liverpool FC and Real Madrid CF in the first knockout round.

Previous meetings
This will be his fourth meeting with FC Barcelona. He was the referee when they met Panathinaikos FC in Athens on 18 October 2005 in the group stage en route to winning the competition that season. He also took charge of the group match against Chelsea FC in London on 18 October 2006 and at Camp Nou on 11 December 2002 when Barcelona played Newcastle United FC in the second group stage of the 2002/03 UEFA Champions League. This will be his third meeting with FC Shakhtar Donetsk. He was the referee when the Ukrainian team met Legia Warszawa in Donetsk on 9 August 2006 in the UEFA Champions League third qualifying round and on 24 November 2004 when Shakhtar played AC Milan in the group stage of the 2004/05 UEFA Champions League.