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His first Burnley game was a crucial 2-1 defeat at Bournemouth just a week before the win against Plymouth kept us up in the Waddle season. At Bournemouth he awarded each side a penalty (Damian Matthew scored ours) and booked Andy Cooke, Mark Ford, Glen Little and Mark Winstanley along with one Bournemouth player.
He certainly proved a lucky omen the following season. Twice he refereed Burnley games away from home and, even in a bad season, twice we scored four times.
The first of those was the 4-0 win at Colchester that saw both Andy Cooke and Glen Little again find their way into his notebook and then there was the 4-1 win at Stoke that virtually ended any relegation fears. On that occasion Paul Cook and Tom Cowan were the only players booked. And that has been it since apart from the Huddersfield game as far as the Clarets are concerned.
This season has only just got under way for him. His first match of the season was only last month and to date in six games he has issued fourteen yellow cards and one red card. He sent off Exeter’s Glen Cronin in the last minute of their 5-2 home defeat against Kettering last week.
A year ago this weekend he refereed the 1st Division game between Walsall and Manchester City, tomorrow’s game will be his first at this level since.