Oliver is in his first season as a Football League referee and it is just over a month since he was allocated his first ever game in the Championship when he was referee for Derby’s 1-0 home win against Plymouth.
Apart from that his action this season has been entirely in League One and League Two, apart from a couple of cup ties involving lower league and non-league clubs.
His first season hasn’t been too dramatic and in thirty games to date he has handed out just four red cards. The first to see the Oliver red card was Barnsley’s Tony Vaughan in their 1-1 draw at
He’s since sent off Will McDonagh of Carlisle in their 2-1 LDV Vans win over
There’s a worrying pattern to his yellow cards though which should worry QPR more than the Clarets – in those games he has handed out 79 yellow cards in total with just 26 of them going to home team players and 53 to away team players.
Tonight he will be assisted by Russell Green (Lancashire) and Michael Short (