Dale’s first foray into this season’s FA Cup at Wrexham on Sunday will be officiated by a headline writer’s dream in the shape of Leicestershire referee Trevor Kettle.
References to whistling and things boiling over are sure to surface, especially if Mr Kettle grabs the headlines as he has been prone to do down the years.
He joined the league list in 2003 and one of his first appointments was Dale’s fine 3-1 win at Torquay in which Robert Betts scored twice and Michael Simpkins was sent-off.
Later that term Trevor was the referee for the famous ‘goose game’ at Scunthorpe, where the invading bird was one of the few performers on the pitch not to be shown a yellow card — Mr Kettle ridiculously booking 11 players having made a rod for his own back early in the match.
Trevor’s most recent Dale appointment was in August when he refereed our 1-1 home draw with Doncaster.
The full list of his Dale games is:
Aug 03 Torquay v Rochdale W 3-1
Apr 04 Scunthorpe v Rochdale D 2-2
Oct 06 Rochdale v Stockport L 1-3
Feb 09 Rochdale v Grimsby W 2-0
Jan 12 Rochdale v Preston D 1-1
Oct 12 Rochdale v Oxford W 2-0
Apr 14 Mansfield v Rochdale L 0-3
Jan 15 Rochdale v Crawley W 4-1
Dec 15 Rochdale v Colchester W 3-1
Nov 16 Gillingham v Rochdale L 0-3
Mar 18 Rochdale v Fleetwood L 0-2
Sep 18 Sunderland v Rochdale L 1-4
Aug 19 Rochdale v Doncaster D 1-1
So far this season, Mr Kettle has refereed 13 matches, in which he has shown 40 yellow cards and four red. His most recent game was Sunderland v Southend last Saturday.