Phil Dowd of Staffordshire will referee our Premiership match at Arsenal on Saturday.

The 45-year old has been refereeing for 24 years now and took up the whistle after taking charge of a local game when the original referee did not turn up. He was told by both managers that he was poor, so he decided to prove them both wrong and went on a refereeing course.

Three years after receiving his certificate he was officiating in the Staffordshire Senior League. In 1992 he was promoted to the Football League as a linesman. He spent five seasons with the flag before finally been given the chance in the middle of the park. Four years later he finally made the big jump to the Premiership.

He has now been refereeing in the top flight for 7 seasons, and his relatively late start as a referee has probably prevented any promotion to European football. Last season though he was heavily criticised by Paul Jewell, who was the Wigan manager at the time, and the Wigan owner Dave Whelan after his performance during their clash with Arsenal at the Emirates Stadium. Jewell claimed he was the worst referee in the league and that he had sworn at his players. Jewell was charged with ‘Improper Conduct' and Dowd did not referee another top flight game for the rest of the season. This meant that he never refereed Liverpool at all during 2007, his next Liverpool match was in December 2006 against Watford.

This will be his third Arsenal game of the season, both previous games have also been at The Emirates. In fact his previous five Arsenal games have all been at The Emirates. Arsenal have also never lost with Dowd in charge, a run of ten games so far in all competitions.

He has refereed Liverpool sixteen times previously and our record is won eight, drawn three and lost five. It will also be his third Liverpool match of this season, we have won the previous two games, 5-2 against Havant and Waterlooville and 3-1 at Bolton Wanderers.

His assistants for the game are Andrew Butler and Mark Scholes with Mike Riley as the fourth official. This is the same team of referee and assistants that took charge of our win at Bolton recently.

Some memorable matches involving Liverpool and Phil Dowd.

6th November 2002 - Liverpool beat Southampton 3-1 in a Worthington Cup tie. The game saw the debut of John Otsemobor and Patrik Berger's last Liverpool goal.

5th February 2003 - Crystal Palace shock Liverpool by winning 2-0 in a FA Cup 4th round reply, they even had Dougie Freedman sent-off for elbowing Sami Hyppia.

13th November 2004 - Milan Baros scores his first ever Liverpool hat-trick including two penalties - one of them in the last minute to beat Crystal Palace 3-2.

25th October 2005 - Crystal Palace knock us out of the Carling Cup with a 2-1 win at Selhurst Park.

30th November 2005 - Momo Sissoko is sent off in a 2-0 win at Sunderland.

25th March 2006 - 10 yellows and 2 reds as Everton are defeated 3-1 at Anfield with goals from a Phil Neville (og), Garcia and Harry Kewell.

23rd December 2006 - Craig Bellamy scores his last Liverpool goal in a 2-0 home win over Watford.

26th January 2008 - A Benayoun hat-trick sees off a spirited performance by Havant & Waterlooville in the FA Cup.

2nd March 2008 - Aurelio scores his first Liverpool goal in a 3-1 win at Bolton.