Not a celebrity fan but I was at an in-convo event with Kevin Rowland last night in London. During the interval, I started chatting to the bloke on my right. Turns out he was a former assistant referee. I asked him at what level, expecting to be impressed by him saying something like the Beezer Homes league. Turned-out he ran the line at the 2002 World Cup final! He was very modest and I only discovered this by asking him who was the most famous ref he'd worked with, and I suggested Pierluigi Collina. I checked afterwards and sure enough, he was the ref that day.
Told him I was Villa and asked did he have any Villa/Villa Park memories. He said he was the lino for a game in 2008 against Portsmouth when a coin was thrown at him and he narrowly avoided serious injury. It rang a distant bell with me, just looked it up now. Sounds like he underplayed it. The moron who threw the 50p was dealt with, fortunately.
He trains referees now and loves his job. We had a quick chat about VAR, obviously. He seemed quite progressive, said there was no point in complaining about technology, just try and make it work as well as possible. But that he's glad he ran the line before it was introduced. Much less fun when you're being overruled by a machine.
He had some massive old Dexys posters for Kev to sign. They were in a tube and were pretty impressive to be honest. I left him to it as he was laying them out on a table waiting for Rowland's scroll.
Wished him well and asked him was he on social media. With consummate old-school professionalism, he handed me a business card. But it's for his interest in music artwork. Still, if you need a FIFA-approved match official, I might be able to assist.
