Thomas Balvay Thomas Balvay Thomas Balvay (2 February 1888 – 15 July 1945) was a football referee in the 1920s and 1930s and one of four European referees who participated in the first FIFA World Cup in 1930 in Uruguay. He was the only match official from France at the tournament. He had been an international referee since 1922 and twice refereed the Coupe de France (in 1926 and 1928). He travelled to Uruguay on the SS "Conte Verde", which also took Jules Rimet and the French, Belgian, Romanian and Brazilian teams to the first World Cup; picking up the teams en
Theft of the Jules Rimet Trophy had also approached him for the job, but he refused out of patriotism and because his brother had died of a heart attack when Brazil won the Jules Rimet Trophy. Peralta and the rest of the suspects were arrested, and it was claimed that the trophy was melted into gold bars by Juan Carlos Hernández, an Argentine gold dealer. Hernández denied the accusation, and the traces of gold found after an analysis of his foundry did not match the material of the trophy. In addition, doubts were raised because the trophy was not made of solid gold; it could not