Surrey-based Charles Breakspear will be the referee for the Iron’s match on Tuesday evening, when we visit Cheltenham Town in search of a return to the league’s summit.
Breakspear will be refereeing the Claret and Blue for the second time this season, after overseeing our 4-0 loss to Exeter at Glanford Park in October. He cautioned five players in that game, two of which were Sean McAllister and Terry Hawkridge.The referee is in his first season in the Football League - he had previously taken charge of Conference Premier matches before the Surrey FA promoted him to Level 1 refereeing status, which meant he could officiate in the Football League’s divisions.
He has taken charge of mostly League Two fixtures this season, with a few matches in League One, one in the Championship and a couple in the FA Cup and Johnstone’s Paint Trophy.
Those fixtures have totalled 20 games this season, where he has given out 83 bookings and eight reds, including two in one game as Carlisle lost 1-0 at Gillingham.
He showed Gillingham defender Leon Legge a second yellow card and the Cumbrians’ Lee Miller a straight red for an incident which happened off the ball.
His most recent match, on 19th March, saw a red card produced too, in Newport’s 2-1 home defeat to Dagenham.
Newport’s David Pipe was shown his second yellow card and Dags manager Wayne Burnett was sent to the stands for verbally abusing the referee in the bad-tempered clash.
In the Conference Premier last year, Breakspear took charge of 26 matches in total, showing 91 yellows and six reds before being rewarded with promotion.
Breakspear has previously refereed the Robins, having taken charge of their 3-1 defeat to Plymouth at the Abbey Business Stadium in August.
He will be assisted on the lines by Simon Barrow and Joe Clark and Simon Brown will be his fourth official on Tuesday evening.