Select Group 2 referee Geoff Eltringham is the man in the middle for Dale’s trip to Gigg Lane on Tuesday.
The Tyne & Wear official was a regular at our games for seven seasons up to the start of last term, when he was promoted to the new group of referees who mainly officiate in the Championship.
This is why we haven’t seen Geoff at a Dale match since September 2015 when we drew 1-1 at Fleetwood, a game in which Ian Henderson missed an injury-time penalty.
That was Mr Eltringham’s eighth Dale appointment since he joined the National List in 2009, one of which was the terrible FA Cup home loss to FC United.
The full record of Geoff’s Dale games is:
Sep 09 Bradford (h, JPT), L 1-2
Aug 10 Barnsley (a, CC), W 1-0
Nov 10 FC United (h, FAC), L 2-3
Sep 11 Scunthorpe (h), W 1-0
Apr 13 Plymouth (h), W 1-0
Feb 14 Morecambe (h), W 2-1
Aug 14 Peterborough (h), L 0-1
Sep 15 Fleetwood (a), D 1-1
Before Friday, when he was due to take charge of Leeds v Bolton, Geoff had refereed 29 matches this term, showing 109 yellow cards and two red.
His last two League One appointments were also local derbies — Rotherham v Doncaster at the end of February and Blackburn v Wigan a week later.