Long-serving Football League referee Andy D’Urso will take charge of Dale’s local derby with Accrington on Saturday.
This will be only the second visit to Spotland for the Essex-based official, whose last game at the fortress was in April 2009 when we lost 2-0 in a televised encounter with Darlington, for whom Jason Kennedy scored a spectacular long-range goal.
More recently, Andy was the referee for our dramatic 2-2 draw at Chesterfield, in which he awarded Dale a late penalty and sent-off the home side’s Marc Richards for handball on the line.
Mr D’Urso has been on the referees’ list since 1994/95, with only Scott Mathieson, of the current officials, having longer service.
Andy even spent some time officiating in the Premier League, although the over-riding memory from that experience is of him being surrounded by a group of baying Manchester United players for daring to give a penalty against them at Old Trafford many years ago.
That was in Andy’s formative days as a Premier League referee and although he went on to establish himself at that level and earn a FIFA badge, he was removed from the Select Group after making a few errors that were technical rather than serious.
Nevertheless, Mr D’Urso has continued to receive high profile Football League appointments, including the League One play-off final between Doncaster and Leeds in 2007/08 and Brentford v Yeovil last season.
He will be back at Wembley in a fortnight as referee for Chesterfield v Peterborough in the JPT Final.
Andy was also the man in the middle for the Bury v Accrington game on the final day of the 2008/09 season, allegedly blowing up early after the mongs, sorry fans, had invaded the pitch thinking they had won promotion.
Andy’s full Dale record is:
27 Aug 1994 Gillingham (a) D 1-1
7 Oct 1995 Gillingham (a) L 0-1
9 Nov 1996 Barnet (a) L 2-3
31 Mar 1997 Fulham (a) D 1-1
13 Apr 1999 Cambridge (a) D 1-1
18 Apr 2009 Darlington (h) L 0-2
13 Mar 2010 Shrewsbury (a) W 1-0
20 Sep 2011 Aldershot (a, CC) L 1-2
21 Jan 2014 Chesterfield (a) D 2-2
So far this season, Andy has refereed 26 matches, showing 75 yellow cards and eight red.
His most recent fixtures have been Burnley v Nottingham Forest and Sheffield Wednesday v Middlesbrough in the Championship, while on Tuesday he was at Stevenage v Preston in League One.