Our trip to Hillsborough is this Saturday and the referee will be the familiar face of Colin Webster. Webster is one of those referees we often see officiating Burnley matches and that is shown by the fact he officiated Burnley three times last season.

The last time he was in charge of the Clarets was towards the end of last season when he was at Turf Moor for the televised match between the Clarets and Norwich City. On that occasion he refereed the game sensibly as both teams were keen to get on with the game. He was also the referee at Bramall Lane when he kept his cards in his pocket throughout and had a very good game as we lost 3-0 to Sheffield United.

Webster also refereed on the opening game of the season as we lost 2-1 to Crewe. In that match he cautioned five players, 2 from Crewe and 3 for us. His last two matches in charge of the Clarets have been a vast improvement on those in the 2004/05 season where he had a very poor game at home against Leeds and got several key decisions wrong, while against Wolves last season the word to describe his performance would be fussy.

Last season he showed he is not afraid of using his cards averaging over four cautions a game, and used his red card twelve times. Webster last season started with a lot of cards in his opening games with five cautions or more in nine of his first eleven games.

This season he started with the League One match involving Rotherham and Brighton. In this game he cautioned three players; Sharp for Rotherham, and Revell and Dean Cox for Brighton. Just before half-time Webster sent-off Dean Cox of Brighton on his full debut for two cautions.

Mr Webster was promoted to the national list of referees in 2000, six years after joining the assistant referees list, and was an assistant referee in the 2000 FA Trophy final. Phillip Bramley and Russell Tiffin will assist Mr. Webster. The fourth official will be Ian Smedley.

Many thanks as always to the Ref Assessor.

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