Dale will hope there isn’t a sense of déjà-vu when Oliver Langford referees Saturday’s potential promotion-clincher at home to Cheltenham.

Four years ago the West Midlands-based official was at Spotland for the late-season midweek encounter with Darlington which Dale needed to win to seal their promotion from League Two.

As we all remember, Darlo won 1-0 to postpone Dale’s promotion, although the victory couldn’t prevent The Quakers’ relegation to non-league football.

More recently, we have happier experiences with Oliver as the referee.

Just two months ago he was in charge at AFC Wimbledon where Scott Hogan’s hat-trick helped Dale to a 3-0 success.

We also met Mr Langford in the first half of the 2011/12 season when he refereed the 2-0 Carling Cup win at QPR and the 1-0 league victory at Preston.

However, another contrast is provided by the last time we saw Oliver at Spotland, which was in December 2012 when York won 3-2 after racing into a 3-0 half-time lead.

Saturday will be his eighth Dale fixture, with the first — our 3-1 home defeat of Barnet in August 2008 - being Oliver’s debut game at Football League level.

He also refereed Dale on Boxing Day 2009 in the exciting 2-2 draw at Crewe in which Kallum Higginbotham scored a terrific long-range goal.

So far this season Mr Langford has officiated at 34 matches, showing 70 yellow cards and four red.

His most recent appointment was at Oxford v York last Saturday, while the week before he refereed the televised game between QPR and Nottingham Forest.

Photo: Action Images

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