Monday afternoon’s referee at the Liberty is Peter Bankes who makes his third trip to South West Wales this season having already overseen our games with Manchester City and Bournemouth, neither of which the Swans won.
As a Premier League official it will be just his 6th Championship appearance of the season with 14 yellows and 1 red cards being a fairly small return from his games to date.
Bankes and Swansea do have some controversy which involved a game between us and Charlton, a game the Swans won 2-1 but caused then Charlton boss Lee Bowyer to question the integrity of the official.
The Charlton manager was quoted saying: “You were absolutely horrendous you tonight. I bet you are pleased. I see you looked after your mate from your academy days tonight” – comments which earned Bowyer a £4,000 fine and a three match touchline ban.
At an Independent Regulatory Commission hearing, Bowyer said he was talking to Swansea boss Steve Cooper ahead of the game, before Bankes engaged in a lengthy conversation with the Welshman.
At the end of the chat, Cooper said to Bowyer: “Don’t worry we’re not best mates, he just used to do all our academy games.”
Bankes was appointed as a Select Group 1 referee ahead of the 2019/20 season and he will be assisted by James Mainwairing and Nick Greenhalgh whilst Sam Allison is the fourth official.