Maranho: "I'm leaving my name in the history of world refereeing"

MIAMI (United States) - When you’re passionate about a sport, you dream of going as far as possible. That doesn’t only apply to players and coaches, but also to referees. And thus, Cristiano Maranho dreamt and dreamt, and he accompanied that dream with a lot of work. In 1995, he took the refereeing course in the Brazilian Federation. On the following year, they called him to take the national referee course, and in 1998, he passed the international referee exam.

“I’m very happy with my trajectory. Thanks to God and also to my efforts, I managed to fulfill all my dreams and the goals I set for myself at the beginning of my career,” assured Maranho, who started his passion for this sport when he was 13 years old and saw on TV how Brazil defeated United States in the final match of the 1987 Pan-American Games.

As an international referee, Maranho stood out for many years, and he was considered done of the best five of the world. His résumé speaks for itself: three Olympic Games (Beijing 2008, London 2012, and Rio 2016), four World Cups (Japan 2006, Turkey 2010, Spain 2014, and China 2019). Also, he refereed at the Women’s World Cup in 2010, the 2017 Eurobasket and at Lima 2019 Pan-American Games final match.

“Along my career, I had several important moments, all the final matches I participated in left a mark in me. But I had two moments that left a much greater mark: the first match of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games, when I stepped on the Olympic rings on the court (Argentina vs. Australia men) and the 2017 Eurobasket quarterfinal match between Spain and Turkey,” said Maranho.

On Monday, March 29th, at the match between Caballos de Coclé and Titanes de Barranquilla for Group A of the Basketball Champions League Americas, Cristiano Maranho retired from international refereeing. “When I stepped into the court, I thought: ‘my last match as a FIBA referee’, but when the match began, I forgot all about it and tried to do my job as best as I could. At the end of the match, I was hugged by my colleagues, and also by coach Flor Meléndez, and I got very emotional, I even cried in the locker room. I had the feeling that I had fulfilled my duty and that I had done the best I could for refereeing. I’m very happy and very grateful for my career in basketball. I think I’m leaving my name in the history of world refereeing,” he stated.

“Basketball gave me many friends around the world, but it also allowed me to know amazing places. I’m very happy, I was able to fulfill my dreams.” Cristiano led and still leads by example in Brazilian basketball, since after a 26-year trajectory, he’s become a model for the younger referees.

FIBA