Surrey referee Gavin Ward is the man in the middle for Saturday’s trip to Valley Parade to take on Bradford City.

We last saw Gavin at Cheltenham in October 2013 where two late Ian Henderson goals helped Dale come from behind to record a crucial 2-1 win on their way to promotion.

Prior to that, Mr Ward was the referee at Torquay in August 2012 where Dale were on the end of a 4-2 defeat, although he did send-off a home defender and award Dale a penalty, which Jason Kennedy unfortunately missed.

Gavin also took charge of two consecutive Dale games at Bournemouth; our 2-1 win there in May 2011 and the 1-1 draw five months later when Gary Jones and Michael Symes each scored penalties.

In March 2009 he was the man in the middle for Dale’s 2-1 loss at Barnet, where Chris Dagnall was shown a straight red card for a bad tackle.

Going back seven years to January 2008, Gavin refereed Dale’s trip to Wycombe where he spotted a late foul on Ben Muirhead and gave a penalty which Tom Kennedy converted for the only goal of the game.

So far this season Mr Ward has refereed 19 matches, showing 72 yellow cards and four red.

He was most recently at Southend v Dagenham over the Christmas period.

Photo: Action Images

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