Bury visit Spotland again this Tuesday night, so we take a look at who'll be the referee for this game - Mr Eddie Ilderton of Newcastle.

Eddie Ilderton is one of the most regular referees at Dale matches down the years.

Tuesday will be his 11th Dale game since he joined the league list in 2002 and his eighth at Spotland.

However, you have to go back to Eddie’s linesman days for his first appearance at our famous old ground.

He was on the line when we played Rushden & Diamonds in the play-off game at Spotland in April 2002, a night most of us have tried to put out of our heads.

Four months later he was back as a referee for the opening game of the season against Leyton Orient when Paul Connor scored a 90th minute winner for Dale.

Eddie has refereed Dale in this competition before and hopefully we will get a similar result on Tuesday.

Back in September 2004, he was in the middle when we faced Scarborough in the LDV Vans Trophy, a game memorable for Gareth Griffiths’ hat-trick.

More recently, Eddie was the referee when Dale won 2-1 at Notts County last season, with Nathan Stanton’s antics giving us all a bit of a laugh!


Eddie’s full Dale record is:

10 August 2002 Rochdale v Leyton Orient won 1-0
11 February 2003 Darlington v Rochdale won 1-0
15 April 2003 Rochdale v Kidderminster H lost 0-1
27 September 2003 Lincoln C v Rochdale drew 1-1
28 September 2004 Rochdale v Scarborough (LDV) won 4-1
13 November 2004 Rochdale v Oxford U (FAC) won 2-1
18 December 2004 Rochdale v Bristol R drew 0-0
27 August 2005 Rochdale v Macclesfield T won 3-1
17 April 2006 Rochdale v Peterborough U won 1-0
17 February 2007 Notts Co v Rochdale won 2-1


5 famous Eddies

• Eddie Kidd
• Eddie Yates
• Eddie Gray
• Charles and Eddie
• Edison Lighthouse

Photo: Action Images

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