In a case of deja-vu, Richard Clark is the man in the middle for Dale’s home game versus Shrewsbury Town on Friday afternoon.

The Northumberland referee was in charge of the very same fixture last season, which fans may recall took place on the Friday night before New Year’s Eve.

Dale won the game 2-1, but the second goal should really have been disallowed, as Steven Davies was clearly standing in an offside position when the ball was knocked to him by Ian Henderson, who had arguably kicked it out of the goalkeeper’s grasp just for good measure!

Henderson had earlier given Dale the lead when he outpaced The Shrews’ defence before curling a neat shot into the far corner.

Ivan Toney, who scored for Scunthorpe against Dale last Saturday, pulled back a late goal for The Shrews.

Now in his sixth season on the league list, Dale will always provide Mr Clark with good memories as his debut match at this level was our 1-1 draw at Chesterfield in August 2012.

We then saw him again later in the campaign when he refereed the exciting 2-2 home draw with promotion-bound Port Vale.

In 2013/14, Richard officiated at Dale’s 2-1 home loss to Fleetwood, while in 2014/15 he took charge of the FA Cup replay defeat of Northampton and the 2-1 midweek win at Notts County.

As well as least season’s home game versus Shrewsbury, Mr Clark also oversaw Dale’s 2-0 loss at Coventry two months earlier.

Injury problems have blighted Richard over the last few years and he has so far refereed only five games this season, showing 12 yellow cards and two red.

The most recent of those appointments was Carlisle v Cambridge last Saturday.

Photo: Action Images

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