One of the EFL’s up and coming referees, Josh Smith, gets his second QPR game with our Sunday morning trip to Luton.

Referee: >>> Josh Smith (Lincolnshire), at 28 Smith is one of the youngest referees on the EFL circuit.

Assistants >>> Jonathan Hunt (Merseyside) and Ian Cooper (Kent)

Fourth official: >>> James Linington (Isle of Wight)

History

Blackpool 1 QPR 1, Saturday November 6, 2021, Championship

Perception — Rangers cannot defend. On nine occasions already this season Mark Warburton’s side has required two goals just to get a point. They’ve conceded goals in the last minute of games five times in ten fixtures. They’re light in the centre of midfield and with the wing backs trying to compensate for that by joining the press it’s easy to get in at an exposed back three, behind which Seny Dieng is rather struggling for form. It can all feel a little bit seat-of-your-pants at times and that was certainly the case here where Blackpool had an early goal controversially disallowed (Perception: Madine is offside. Reality: the ball was over the line anyway so it should have counted, though if he wasn’t such a greedy fucker the error by young referee Josh Smith and linesman Akil Howson would have been irrelevant) and went dangerously close on numerous other occasions. Rob Dickie’s heroic block denied Dougall on ten minutes as another Bowler set piece dropped loose, eight minutes after that Gabriel turned back inside Odubajo in the area tight to the byline and was wrestled to the ground for a half decent penalty shout. It felt like the R’s were cashing in a few refereeing chips accumulated over the prior few weeks of controversies against us.

Reality — Rangers had kept four clean sheets in eight games prior to this one. Theirs is still the eighth leakiest defence in the Championship, but that’s progress from a few weeks ago when it was the worst bar Peterborough. Rob Dickie was commanding and assured again, Jimmy Dunne a tower of strength under a barrage of wind-assisted high balls bar one near mix up with Dieng over a dodgy back pass. For all Pool’s impressive play, for all QPR’s apparent failings, for all the harum-scarum (Dieng flapped around in the wind all afternoon but saved well at his near post as Expiteta threatened to bundle home from a corner, former Kings Lynn prospect Sonny Carey struck the outside of the post late on) the home team did only score here off the sort of basic individual error that has become too commonplace this season. Yoann Barbet, who was erratic at Cardiff during the week, trying to be too clever by half under a routine cross when the conditions called for a safety-first approach, allowed Gabriel in on Dieng and he rather needlessly thrust out an arm to fell the advancing attacker. Gabriel had already toed the ball well wide of the goal, hence a yellow card, but that meant he didn’t need to make the challenge at all. Barbet’s fault in the main though and, as I’ve apparently got as much chance of saving a penalty for QPR as Dieng has, Madine was able to make it 1-1.

Blackpool: Grimshaw 6; Gabriel 8, Expiteta 7, Husband 6, James 6; Bowler 8 (Mitchell 79, 6), Wintle 7, Dougall 7, Dale 6 (Carey 73, 6); Anderson 8, Madine 6

Subs Not Used: Connolly, Yates, Casey, Gretarsson, Moore

Goals: Madine 54 (penalty won Gabriel)

Bookings: Madine 36 (foul), Anderson 60 (foul)

QPR: Dieng 5; Adomah 5, Dickie 7, Dunne 7, Barbet 5, Odubajo 5 (Kakay 46, 6); Dozzell 6, Amos 5 (Ball 73, 6), Chair 7; Willock 7 (Austin 73, 5), Dykes 5

Subs not used: Archer, Field, Duke-Mckenna, Thomas

Goals: Willock 26 (assisted Chair)

Bookings: Odubajo 33 (foul), Adomah 50 (foul), Dieng 53 (foul), Ball 82 (foul), Dunne 90+5 (foul)

Referee — Josh Smith 5 Very difficult game to referee, and the EFL’s youngest middle man copped plenty from an enthusiastic home crowd. The Dougall/Madine disallowed goal is wrong, it’s a big decision which has cost Blackpool the match, so the mark is never going to be particularly high. Of the other big decisions: I’d have wanted the Odubajo/Gabriel penalty appeal in the first half but I can maybe see why it was waved away; their penalty they did get, along with the yellow rather than the red, is fair enough; most of the bookings were just, though Odubajo can perhaps count himself slightly fortunate it was only a yellow; Dougall lucky not to have seen yellow for persistent and ongoing haranguing of the match officials. Tough task for the referee, but it certainly felt like QPR got the rub of plenty of green here.

Stats

Josh Smith was promoted onto the Football League list for the 2019/20 season aged 26, despite an operation to pin a regularly dislocated shoulder the season before. The former Bourne Grammar School student is one of the EFL’s youngest officials and he began life at this level with 26 appointments, 81 yellows and six reds, spread across Leagues One and Two and concluding with a League Two play-off semi-final between Colchester and Exeter.

His first Championship appointment, in October 2020, was quite a thing — eight yellows and a red in Huddersfield’s 2-1 home defeat against Preston. That was part of a 54 yellows and two reds from 19 games season in 2020/21 which included five Championship games. It also featured five yellows in Blackpool’s 1-0 home win against Portsmouth in League One.

He’s been very busy this season with 32 appointments bringing 124 yellows and four reds to this point, led by seven yellows and a red at Blackburn’s recent 2-0 home defeat to Forest. He refereed Luton’s 3-0 FA Cup win at Cambridge.

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