This referee was bang out of order

Last updated : 09 August 2002 By Tony Scholes

Bates in discussion with Paul Gascoigne last season with Bally looking on
Last season Bates made three visits to Turf and on two of those occasions he ruled the Turf Moor pitch unplayable. On New Year’s Day he decided that the pitch, protected by under soil heating, was frozen and a couple of months later called the game off again when the pitch was waterlogged.

When the Bradford City match did eventually go ahead his performance certainly upset Stan when he was the only person in the town who didn’t spot Gunnar Halle push David Johnson for a blatant penalty.

It was Gazza’s debut and a game we should have won and one we would have won had we been awarded that spot kick and scored from it. Stan said after the game,

"How that's not a penalty I will never know. If that's not a penalty I don't know what is. It is ridiculous. My players work hard for nine months and they don't get a bang to rights penalty. These are important decisions that can turn the game. It is not an excuse, it is just a fact. You get in trouble if you criticise referees but he was bang out of order. He is responsible to those players out there. How can 20 odd thousand people see it and he didn't, it is ridiculous."

His previous visit had been somewhat controversial although nothing to do with him, he was in charge of the home defeat against York in 1998/99 after which Stan ended the Burnley careers of Steve Blatherwick, Lee Howey, Michael Williams and Mark Winstanley.

Bates ended last season with 78 yellow and 4 red cards in 38 games and this compared favourably against the record of Barry Knight who reached for his pocket 116 times in total in just 29 games.

He did though try to make a name for himself at the Turf and booked Gascoigne for his first foul of the game and Mitchell Thomas and Bradford’s Gunnar Halle were added to that.

His last game was the Birmingham v Millwall play off match at St. Andrews last May, a game that saw just one booking for Millwall’s David Livermore. He handled that game superbly and it is hoped he can have another game like that tomorrow at the Turf.