Ref Watch ..... Port Vale away

[Mick]

Saturday's referee is Rob Shoebridge from Ripley, Derbyshire, in his 6th season as a Football League referee.

His career seemed to be developing nicely until a couple of years ago when he was responsible for one of the worst decisions in the history of refereeing - right up there with Attwell's phantom goal at Reading. The incident was at the Bristol City - Palace game when a Freddie Sears shot went into the goal and came out again off the backboards (which have presumably now been removed). Mr Shoebridge and his trusty assistants failed to spot this despite the celebrating forwards and dejected defenders and insisted on a goal kick. This displeased Neil Warnock no end - so it wasn't all bad !

He was given a short break after that but has long since been welcomed back into the fold and given some good appointments so his face obviously fits !

This appears to be his first outing of the season but the last two seasons his card count has been remarkably low. A decent referee who will try to let the game flow.

His last Southend match was the away draw at Shrewsbury last season when he cautioned Mohsni and a couple of theirs. Before that it was the match which finally brought the curtain down on a truly dreadful season at Southampton and before that the shocking Cup tie at Gillingham the same season where we simply did not compete. He did fine though.

He has also refereed Southend twice before that, both in 2007/8. Home to Tranmere (2-1 defeat) away to Swindon (1-0 win).

Assisting will be Darren England from Barnsley and Peter Gooch from Wigan with Ryan Newman also from Barnsley doing the numbers board.

The referee's assessor for this match is ex-League official Roy Burton from, yes, Burton.

 

[Bluepen]

Thanks Mick enjoyed the read very informative i like that !

 

[Mick]

Thanks Mick enjoyed the read very informative i like that !

Not as informative as it might have been !

Another late change; the match was actually refereed by Jon Moss from Leeds, a recent recruit to the Select Group of referees.

 

[Lord Football]

...and it showed. He looked out of his depth for long periods.

His decision making was extremely poor. One incident summed it up. He gives us a throw (could have gone either way). Vale player protests and gets a yellow. Within a minute a Vale player clearly puts the ball in the same place as the original throw and he gives it to Vale! He seemed to be affected by the noise the home support made in the middle of the second half, and we went for long periods without getting anything that looked vaguely like a 50/50. I have to admit I was slightly worried they'd get a second penalty towards the end when a lot of high balls were being aimed towards our penalty box.