Three Asian referee trios are among the 19 who will remain in South Africa as of 1 July for the last eight matches.

The Asian referees are Ravshan Irmatov (Uzbekistan), Khalil Al Ghamdi (Saudi Arabia) and Yuichi Nishimura (Japan).

Al Ghamdi’s assistants will be Hassan Kamranifar (Iran) and Saleh Al Marzouqi (UAE) while Irmatov will be assisted by Rafael Ilyasov (Uzbekistan) and Bahadyr Kochkarov (Kyrgyzstan).

Toru Sagara (Japan) and Jeong Hae Sang (Korea Republic) will be the assistants for Nishimura.

No announcement has been made as of press time as to which matches the Asian trio will be assigned to.

In total, 19 out of the 29 referee trios have been retained for the quarter-final stage.

Both Irmatov, two-time AFC Referee of the Year, and AFC Elite Referee Nishimura have been given the honour to referee three times each in the 2010 FIFA World Cup South Africa group stage.

Al Ghamdi, meanwhile has so far refereed two matches.

Irmatov had the honour of refereeing the first match of the tournament on June 11 between hosts South Africa and Mexico and received praise for his work.

Nishimura officiated the second match between Uruguay and France.