Andy Madley will be the man-in-the-middle for Dale’s trip to Shrewsbury on Saturday.
He replaces the originally appointed referee, Kevin Johnson, who is unavailable.
Mr Madley is in his sixth season on the league list and this term has been a member of the Select Group 2 referees who mainly operate in the Championship.
However, over the past few weeks Andy has also been training with the Select Group referees who officiate in the Premier League and he was seen in several clips with Jamie Carragher and Gary Neville in last weekend’s Sky documentary about match officials.
This will be Madley’s ninth Dale game since he joined the list, with his most recent being our 4-1 defeat at Port Vale last April.
On that occasion, like this Saturday, he was a late replacement for the original referee, so let’s hope history doesn’t repeat itself with the result!
The full list of Mr Madley’s Dale matches as a referee is:
Dec 11 Walsall (a) D 0-0
Apr 12 Exeter (h) W 3-2
Feb 13 Accrington (h) L 0-3
Feb 14 Dagenham (h) L 0-1
Sep 14 Walsall (h) W 4-0
Jul 15 Huddersfield (h, F) W 4-3
Oct 15 Oldham (h) D 0-0
Apr 16 Port Vale (a) L 1-4
Formerly a PE teacher from Ossett, Andy is the brother of Premier League and FIFA referee Bobby Madley.
In total this season, he has refereed 38 matches, showing 128 yellow cards and six reds. His last game was Preston v Bristol City on Tuesday.