Robert Jones, widely regarded as the best referee in the EFL, will take charge of Dale’s trip to Blackpool on Saturday.

The Merseyside official is only in his third season at league level, but he has made such big strides that he has already earned himself promotion to the Select Group 2 list of referees.

This means he largely oversees matches in the Championship, the most recent of which were Sheffield Wednesday v Leeds last Friday and Blackburn v Sheffield United on Wednesday..

Mr Jones also refereed the first EFL game of the season — Reading v Derby — as well as Ipswich v Norwich at the start of September.

He was also in action in the last round of the Carabao Cup at Burton v Burnley.

This comes after Robert finished last season refereeing Rotherham v Shrewsbury in the League One play-off final at Wembley.

These appointments and the views of those ‘in the know’ suggest it won’t be too long before Mr Jones is refereeing in the Premier League.

As far as we are concerned, this will be Robert’s fifth Dale appointment.

He was in the middle for our 1-0 loss at Port Vale in August 2016, before overseeing the 1-0 win at Charlton two months later.

Robert then made his first refereeing appearance at the Crown Oil Arena in January 2017 when Dale entertained Oxford, although on that occasion he was a replacement for the unavailable Darren Drysdale.

Fans may recall Dale went into that match having won ten consecutive home games, only to lose 4-0!

On the other hand, his most recent Dale game saw a 4-0 win at Slough in the FA Cup last December.

So far this term, Jones has refereed 11 matches, showing 34 yellow cards and no red.

Photo: Action Images

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