The FIFA Intercontinental Cup 2025 Qatar™ presented by Aramco came to a thrilling conclusion on Wednesday evening, as Paris Saint-Germain made history and became the first club side from France to lift a FIFA trophy. As well as the exciting action on the pitch, the tournament has also provided a further opportunity to enhance its use of football technology to assist match officials and ensure the highest possible levels of refereeing.

The tournament in Qatar introduced innovative developments and offered testing opportunities for FIFA. Leveraging the Electronic Performance and Tracking System, which uses 16 optical tracking cameras installed under the stadium roof, officials received real-time offside alerts based on 29 data points per player captured 50 times per second, as well as the precise location of the ball. The official match balls were also equipped with a sensor providing 500 IMU data points per second, assisting the VAR in determining player contact with the ball and the exact moment of a kick. This technology specifically supported the match officials with fast and accurate offside decisions and offered automated notifications of potential goalkeeper encroachment during penalties.

The “Out of Bounds” technology was tested offline for the first time as well as the “Real-time 3D Recreation” of the match which provided two virtual feeds for the video assistant referee (VAR) that replicated the view of both goalkeepers.

These innovations were tested during all three games: the FIFA Derby of the Americas between Cruz Azul and CR Flamengo, the FIFA Challenger Cup between CR Flamengo and Pyramids FC and the FIFA Intercontinental Cup 2025 final between Paris Saint-Germain and CR Flamengo.

‘Out of Bounds’ technology, which was developed by the Football Technology Centre AG – a joint venture between FIFA and Hawk-Eye Innovations - uses the same tracking data points and configurations as advanced semi-automated offside technology and is intended to quickly inform the VAR whether a ball has or has not gone out of play in the build-up to a goal. An incident in the first half of the final of the FIFA Intercontinental Cup where the ball had left the field before a goal was scored provided a good example how such new technology can be used in the future.

Real-time 3D Recreation provided virtual feeds to the VAR and TV viewers. At this tournament two virtual feeds replicating the perspectives of both goalkeepers offered valuable insights for situations such as line-of-sight checks or determining whether the ball was out of play, enhancing decision-making for the VAR and helping TV viewers better understand the referee’s calls.

Advanced Semi-automated offside technology, already officially tested at the FIFA Club World Cup 2025™ as well as at other FIFA tournaments around the world, featured again. This system provides assistant referees with immediate audio alerts when a positional offside occurs on the pitch, greatly speeding up the offside decision-making process. This could be experienced during the match Cruz Azul and CR Flamengo when a goal was immediately flagged for offside without a long delay for the confirmation of the offside decision.

Another application, previously implemented at the FIFA World Cup 2022™ and the FIFA Women's World Cup 2023™, used the same tracking data during the penalty shootout in the tournament final to monitor potential goalkeeper encroachment.