The head of match officials in the COSAFA territory, Felix Tangawarima, believes Gomes is more than ready for the tasks that awaits him because he was upskilled by the federation over the years.

"Gomes now is the chairman of the referees committee of South Africa. Not only that, he's recently been appointed as Vice Chairman of the Confederation of African Football referees committee which is a big task. If it wasn't for the education and the development we did, he will not be up there. So, you find out really, we are so happy with our development plan," Tangawarima said.

Gomes is also the chairperson of the SAFA referees’ committee – an announcement that came a year after he officiated the final AFCON final between Egypt and Senegal when the tournament was held in Cameroon.

Tangawarima highlights even more success from the region.

"I think the COSAFA referees’ development plan produced the backbone of African top referees. As you can remember, a lot of our CAF tournaments have been officiated by the referees from COSAFA," he added.

"Let's take last year, we have the Africa Cup of Nations, the referee was from COSAFA. We have the Champions League; the referees were from COSAFA. We have the Confederation Cup final; the referees were from COSAFA."

It’s no coincidence that Gomes, who has advocated for the use of VAR, now holds such crucial roles on the continent.

Tangawarima gave an update on plans around the implantation of this technology.

"When it started, people thought it was something that was going to go by. But now VAR is in the laws of the game, it's part of the laws of the game. Which actually signifies the importance it is for us as a region to be inclusive in having VAR in our tournaments and in our national associations."

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