Dale’s home game against Ebbsfleet United on Saturday will be refereed by WAYNE CARTMEL.

This will be a Spotland debut for Mr Cartmel, who took charge of the return fixture at Ebbsfleet in October as well as Dale’s FA Trophy third round tie at Leamington.

Now based in Luton, Wayne grew up in the Lake District and started work as a farm hand, before moving into teaching.

He subsequently became the founder and CEO of the company providing the leading applicant tracking system to improve efficiency in the realms of school and trust recruitment, for which he has won a number of awards.

In his third season officiating at this level, Mr Cartmel has mainly refereed fixtures across the south of the country in that time, including eight in the National League this term, the most recent being Tamworth v Boston United three weeks ago. Those eight games have yielded 26 yellow cards.

Photo: Action Images

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