Know the Ref - Inverness Caley Thistle away

Last updated : 31 March 2009 By Stuart Gillespie
In the last two Saints game Mr Collum has done this season, Dargo has been flattened by the opposition keeper. In January, Kilmarnock's Alan Combe did it in new St. Mirren Park's first game, and in November Celtic's Artur Boruc did it at Love Street. Both times the keeper was merely booked. Both were pretty poor all round performances from the official and we drew with Kilmarnock and lost to Celtic. On the plus side, he was the referee when we beat Rangers at Love Street and denied them the traditional last minute penalty. That win was our first in the league for a while, so hopefully history repeats itself this weekend.

There was nothing suspicious about the three Saints games Mr Collum was involved in last season - a win over Saturday's opponents Inverness Caley Thistle (which saw our first goals and points of the season) and draws with Hearts and Gretna. The same goes for games in 2006/07 - a draw with Falkirk and a defeat to Kilmarnock.

He has only done one Caley Thistle game this season - a narrow defeat to Hearts at Tynecastle. Last season he obviously did their defeat at Love Street and also did defeats at both halves of the Old Firm. Notably, he also took charge of their action packed 3-2 win in Gorgie. Each side had a penalty and Hearts keeper Eduardas Kurskis was sent off in amusing style - showing Mr Collum does know how to send off goalies.

In 2006/07 he did four Caley Thistle games - fine wins over Motherwell and Hibs and draws at Dunfermline and Rangers. The latter two both saw red cards, and unsurprisingly it was a Thistle player who was dismissed at Ibrox.

Many Saints fans are understandably weary about Mr Collum's appointment for this game and it will be interesting to see what happens after the last few games. He has shown seven red cards in 27 games so far this season and usually averages around four or five bookings a game. Let's hope his performance is more like the one from our win other Rangers than the Killie and Celtic games.