The familiar figure of Andy Haines will referee Rochdale v Walsall for the second consecutive season on Saturday.

The Tyne & Wear official took charge of The Saddlers’ visit to the Crown Oil Arena in November 2016 and hardly had cause to get involved as Dale romped to their second 4-0 home win in four days.

Four months later he was back in Rochdale as the referee for our 4-1 home defeat of Gillingham, while on the third Saturday of this campaign, Andy refereed Dale’s 3-2 loss at Shrewsbury.

On Saturday, Mr Haines will be taking take charge of his 26th Dale match, which we suspect is probably a record.

Twenty-four of those games have been at the Crown Oil Arena, with the most notable coming on 17th April 2010 when Dale clinched promotion from League Two with a 1-0 victory over Northampton.

The full list of Andy’s Dale matches is:

Sep 07 Rochdale v Macclesfield D 1-1

Jan 08 Chesterfield v Rochdale W 4-3

Apr 08 Rochdale v Bradford W 2-1

Sep 08 Rochdale v Chesterfield W 2-1

Apr 09 Rochdale v Port Vale W 1-0

Jul 09 Rochdale v Everton (friendly) L 1-4

Aug 09 Rochdale v Cheltenham L 0-1

Apr 10 Rochdale v Northampton W 1-0

Jul 10 Rochdale v Bolton (friendly) D 1-1

Oct 10 Rochdale v Yeovil L 0-1

Jan 11 Rochdale v Leyton Orient D 1-1

Jul 11 Rochdale v Leeds (friendly) L 0-1

Aug 11 Rochdale v Huddersfield D 2-2

Nov 11 Rochdale v Preston (JPT) D 1-1 (lost on pens)

Jul 12 Rochdale v Hull (friendly) L 0-1

Sep 12 Rochdale v Burton L 0-1

Feb 13 Rochdale v Chesterfield D 1-1

Jul 13 Rochdale v Blackburn (friendly) D 2-2

Aug 13 Rochdale v Chesterfield D 2-2

Jul 14 Rochdale v Wigan (friendly) W 2-1

Apr 15 Rochdale v Port Vale W 1-0

Jul 15 Rochdale Blackburn (h, friendly), W 2-1

Aug 15 Rochdale v Peterborough W 2-0

Nov 16 Rochdale v Walsall W 4-0

Mar 17 Rochdale v Gillingham W 4-1

Aug 17 Shrewsbury v Rochdale L 2-3

So far this season he has refereed 21 games, showing 63 yellow cards and three red. One of his games was Walsall’s 1-0 home loss to Gillingham last month

Photo: Action Images

Rochdale Polls