After a couple of disrupted seasons Kevin Wright is back on the list full time this term and has Derby v QPR for the second time in his career. QPR will be hoping for a repeat of the first.
Derby County v Queens Park Rangers
Referee: Kevin Wright (Cambridgeshire)
Assistants – Smith (West Midlands) and Weaver (West Midlands)
Fourth Official – Cook (Derbyshire)
Respect
• noun - a feeling of admiration for someone because of their qualities or achievements.
QPR fans have pretty fond memories of visits to Pride Park in the past – Rangers have won one and drawn one in two visits so far and were within four minutes of making that two from two. The victory was a memorable one, achieved with a wonderful goal from Kevin Gallen and thanks to a late penalty save by Simon Royce. It’s nice to remember the good times but let us pause for a moment and consider that super 2-1 victory under Ian Holloway.
Not only is it worth noting that Dexter Blackstock was the Derby scorer that day, but also QPR played for an hour with ten men after Emerson Thome wound Furlong up to such an extent that the QPR man lashed out and the referee, having done nothing to check Thome’s behaviour prior to that, brandished a red card. That referee was Kevin Wright and by some quirk of fate his first QPR match for three seasons is this Saturday at Derby again. It is a good omen that he is the referee again, but he was dire that day and has been dire most times he has done QPR games so do not hope for too much this weekend.
So far this season he has shown 36 yellows (two a game) and three reds in 18 matches. That is a pretty reasonable average and his biggest haul of the season was just four yellows and a red in the Forest v Plymouth game. Seven of his matches have been in the Championship and in that time he has shown 15 yellows and one red.
For whatever reason Wright was only involved between February and April last season – nine games, 16 yellows (1.77 a game) and two reds. Only two of those games were in the Championship. In 2006/07 he refereed 25 games, booking 85 (3.4 a game) and sending two off, including Derby’s 2-1 win at Sheffield Wednesday on their way to promotion. His last full season was 2005/06 when he booked 110 (3.055 a game) in 36 games and sent nine off.
Wright was in charge of three QPR games in the 2005/06 season including the win at Derby. He was the man in the middle for a thrilling 4-3 New Year win at Crewe, a dull 0-0 draw at Cardiff and of course the win at Pride Park. His average rating of five saw him finish joint fifth in the referee league.
Ref: K Wright (Cambridgeshire) 4 No arguments about the penalty decision, or the sending off, but a series of perplexing decisions riled both players and fans on the QPR side. Countless times he waved fouls on Gallen, Sturridge and Moore away claiming they'd dived but at the other end he couldn't the whistle in his mouth quick enough when Peschisolido, Idiakez or Bisgaard crashed to earth - which they did regularly. When a team goes down to ten men defending a lead you'd expect them to concede more free kicks but a final total of 23 free kicks to 8 in Derby's favour is taking things a little bit far, especially with the amount of Rangers free kicks he ignored. Also allowed Emerson Thome to batter Furlong for half an hour with both boots and elbows before the Rangers man foolishly took the bait. LFW Derby Match Report
Ref: K Wright (Cambridgeshire) 4 This guy always has been and sadly always will be a total cretin. He wouldn't notice three diesel engines pulling fifty wagons blasting Cliff Richard hits from the cab until it had run him over. He was up to his usual home orientated, incompetent standard today. LFW Crewe Match Report
Ref: K Wright (Cambridgeshire) 7 Not too bad at all surprisingly. He kept the cards in his pocket although he could quite easily have sent Loovens off for his wild hack on Ainsworth. Allowed the game to flow as much as possible and all in all did a steady job. Most unlike him.LFW Cardiff Match Report
His only other two games with QPR were a 2-1 home win against Nottingham Forest on the last day of the 2004/05 season, and a 1-1 draw against Tranmere at Loftus Road in 2003. In total over his five games he has shown three yellow cards to QPR players, six to opposition players and sent off one of each.
Elsewhere Kevin Friend has Watford v Sheff Utd, which should be good news for the home team if he stays true to form. Lee Probert has obviously upset somebody upstairs as he has Colchester v Cheltenham in League One, Andy Hall has Orient v Bristol Rovers, and once again it is good to see Stuart Attwell finally getting a chance to learn his trade low down rather than being fast tracked too soon – he has Brentford v Notts County. Trevor Kettle has Port Vale v Shrewsbury.