Referee: Stephen Parkinson
Assistant Referees: James Tewson, Samuel Clayton
Fourth Official: Elliot Bell
Usually, this article isn’t really important. We put the refs in the bin after a game, but it’s unfair to judge before.
With that in mind, here comes the judging. I’m going to admit, I’m a little concerned. Let me explain, but not January 2026 me. Let April 2025 and October 2025 me explain.
In April 2025, Parkinson took charge of our 1-1 draw with Shrewsbury, a fairly boring 1-1 draw. It was his first game involving us, and he allowed what looked like a foul on the keeper to go, resulting in them levelling. I wrote:
“There’s no doubt in my mind it’s a foul, and I felt the referee was poor not just for that, but all game. Quelle surprise, he’s a National League referee who was taking control of his first League One match. I’ll be honest; I’m not a fan of that. I can see how stepping up one league is okay, but in the last four months, he’s been in charge of Maidenhead, Forest Green, Wealdstone and Eastleigh. By all means, stepping up a division to Bromley, Harrogate and Salford, but jumping two divisions in three weeks is too much, and it showed inconsistent performance.”
A one-off, one might hope? His second game involving us came earlier in the season, one of only two games we’ve played where we weren’t great and we lost, away at Orient. Nothing big went against us, but again, I wrote:
“I also didn’t rate the referee. Here’s the kicker: I can’t remember why. He didn’t do anything wrong as such, but he just felt uncertain a lot of the time. He gave a couple of soft free kicks, shied away from yellows (certainly should have given House one for a challenge, I recall), and then there were the bizarre 25 seconds of added time. Who adds 25 seconds? There had been a stoppage; surely you just add a minute on. Unless he’s on new technology that (incorrectly) records the exact amount of time you need adding on, he just felt weak.”
He’s fifth in League One this season for fouls per game, but would be top for referees with more than a single game. Fouls per tackle, he’s 10th out of 61, so again, he’s high up there. Don’t expect that to go punished though. Despite awarding more fouls per game than any referee with more than one appearance, and despite having a high fouls-to-tackle ratio, he is 48th for yellows per game.
That might actually work in our favour, but if we were getting a referee who allowed the game to be slowed, gives free kicks, but not yellows, I’d rather it was against a team that wanted the ball, such as Bolton, and not a team who’ll be wanting it to be slow, like Bradford.