His refereeing style has been highly regarded as accurate and controversial at the same time. Recently, he has been identified as the second best referee in the world by the International Federation of Football History and Statistics based on statistics from 2010-2020.[2]
He made his international refereeing debut in the 2008–09 UEFA Cup, taking charge of two games including the group stage fixture between FC Twente and Schalke 04 in December 2008. He oversaw Fulham's second-leg win against Hamburger SV in the 2009–10 UEFA Europa League semi-finals,[5] one of seven matches he refereed in total in the competition that season.
He has also refereed the UEFA Europa League Round of 32 match Manchester City-Dynamo Kyiv on 17 March 2011, which ended in a 1–0 win for Manchester City, but Dynamo Kyiv advanced to the next round after winning 2–1 on aggregate. In that game, Çakır sent off Mario Balotelli and dished out eight yellow cards. In August 2011, he officiated five games including semi-final between Portugal and France 2011 FIFA U-20 World Cup, hosted in Colombia.
On 18 June, he also officiated the Euro 2012 match between Italy and Ireland where he was very precise when it came to ensuring the correct distance from the ball to the defenders' wall,[8] though he also angered the Irish by sending off Keith Andrews one minute before the end of the game. He was not selected to referee a quarter-final game but he was fourth official in the England v Italy quarter-final. On 27 June 2012, he officiated the semi-final match between Portugal and Spain. Çakır showed 9 yellow cards in this match in 120 minutes.[9]
On 5 March 2013, Çakır officiated the UEFA Champions League match between Manchester United and Real Madrid, and, in a controversial[10] decision, sent off Manchester United player Nani during the second half of the match, a decision that enraged Alex Ferguson in what became his last Champions League game as United manager. On 9 July 2014, he was appointed to referee the 2014 FIFA World Cup semi-final match, between Netherlands and Argentina, which was played in São Paulo.
On 5 August 2022, via the official website of the Turkish Football Association his retirement was announced; from now on, his role will consist in training young referees.[17]
^"Son 10 yıla damga vurdu! Cüneyt Çakır dünyada 2. sırada" [It has marked the last 10 years! Cuneyt Cakir is 2nd in the world]. Star.com.tr (in Turkish). 14 January 2021. Archived from the original on 14 April 2021. Retrieved 14 April 2021.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)