Rob Styles of Portsmouth will take charge of his first Liverpool game since his controversial penalty decision against Chelsea gave the blues a point.

The 43-year old from Hampshire began refereeing in 1987 and has had a fairly rapid rise since. He became a Football League linesman in 1994, and finally made the Premiership list of referees in 2000. Two years later FIFA installed him on their list of officials.

Two seasons ago he did get to referee a World Cup qualifier between Luxembourg and Slovenia. This appointment was hot on the heels of the FA Cup Final when Arsenal defeated Manchester United on penalties. That season he also refereed his first Champions League game in Turin as Juventus beat Brugge 1-0.

He earned a reputation of not being backward in getting the cards out of his pocket, and last season Styles showed his yellow card a total of 143 times in 44 games, only 5 less yellows than his previous season. However, he managed to double his red cards by issuing 10 compared to 5. He was quick off the mark this season showing Reading's Dave Kitson a red card within a minute of coming on as a substitute during their draw at Old Trafford. He has already reached last seasons' total of 10 red cards in only 24 games and is averaging just under 4 yellow cards per game.

Rob was one of our luckiest officials until a defeat at Blackburn Rovers on Boxing Day 2006 ended a run of twelve games going back to 3-2 defeat at Charlton Athletic in September 2003. We are undefeated at Anfield with Styles as the referee with only Manchester United and Chelsea gaining a draw in eight games.

It will be his game against Chelsea at the start of this season that will stick in people's minds. He was not given a game the following weekend and he sent a letter of apology to Rafa Benitez. It will be his third game involving Sunderland this season, both previous times were also away from home and both ended up in defeats, 3-2 at Arsenal in October and 1-0 at Blackburn in January. In each game Rob sent off a Sunderland player, Paul McShane at Arsenal and Dwight Yorke at Ewood Park.

His assistants are Michael Murphy and Mike Tingey with Steve Tanner as the fourth official.

A few memorable matches involving Liverpool and Rob Styles:

29th December 2001 - Michael Owen scores his hundredth Liverpool goal in a 1-1 draw at West Ham United

14th August 2002 - Milan Baroš scores his first Liverpool goals in a 3-2 win at Bolton Wanderers

26th January 2003 - Chris Kirkland's season is over as a serious leg injury is suffered during the FA Cup 4th round match at Crystal Palace

2nd November 2003 - A late Danny Murphy penalty gives us a 2-1 win at Fulham. Boa Morte was earlier sent-off for the hosts

30th October 2004 - Djibril Cissé's season is over following his broken leg during the 2-2 draw at Blackburn Rovers

5th February 2005 - Fernando Morientes scores his first Anfield goal in a 3-1 win over Fulham. Andy Cole became the first player to score against Liverpool in the Premiership for four different clubs with Fulham's goal

20th March 2005 - Liverpool beat Everton 2-1 in Styles' first Merseyside derby. Milan Baroš received a red card in the second half

2nd February 2006 - A record Wigan gate of 25,023 see a Sami Hyypiä goal give us all three points at Wigan Athletic

21st March 2006 - Liverpool register their best ever FA Cup win away from Anfield as Birmingham City are trounced 7-0

9th April 2006 - Robbie Fowler nabs the only goal of the game as Liverpool beat Bolton Wanderers. Dietmar Hamann plays his last match at Anfield

19th August 2006 - Robbie Fowler gets a late penalty at Sheffield United on the opening day of the season. The match saw debuts for Aurelio, Pennant, Bellamy and Gonzalez. Jan Kromkamp played in his last Liverpool game.

26th December 2006 - A host of missed chances for Liverpool as Blackburn Rovers gain a 1-0 win at Ewood Park.

20th January 2007 - Goals from Kuyt and Pennant gave us a 2-0 win over Chelsea at Anfield.

19th August 2007 - Torres scores on his Anfield debut, but a controversial penalty decision give Chelsea a share of the points.