James Bell, the referee slated to take charge of Town’s game at home to Charlton on Saturday, is a fan of the Blues’ automatic promotion rivals Sheffield Wednesday, it has emerged.
Bell is listed on the EFL’s website as the man due to be in the middle for Town’s game against the Addicks.
The Sheffield-born official’s support of the Owls was revealed by Plymouth boss and one-time Wednesday striker Ryan Lowe in May 2021 after Argyle - coincidentally another of the challengers for a top-two place - had been beaten 3-1 by Sunderland at Home Park.
Bell had shown Lowe a yellow card during the game for complaints regarding the Black Cats' first goal and afterwards the Pilgrims manager revealed a conversation between the two which had taken place prior to the match.
"He was alright speaking to me before the game,” Lowe told Plymouth Live. "He was a Sheffield Wednesday fan and couldn’t wait to tell he used to sing my name on the Kop, and stuff like that. So I’m spending time with him, showing a bit of respect, and he’s talking fine to me.
"Then I wanted to talk to him at half-time, but he didn’t want to. I was happy to walk off the pitch with him, there was no malice in it. There was no bad language in it. I just said to him, ‘Look, it’s offside’.”
He added: "He was alright wanting to speak to me before the game but when I wanted to speak to him at half-time he just showed me a yellow card.
"I might have said it was rubbish, or it wasn’t good enough, but there were no words for him to give me a yellow card.”
Bell was later criticised by former Premier League and FIFA referee Keith Hackett.
"James Bell talking about the fact he’s a Sheffield Wednesday fan, I don’t think that’s a clever idea,” he told Football Insider.
"Okay, you have to declare your allegiance to a club pre-season and that’s where you should leave it.
"The allegiance to the club should not be chatted about. The reality is we’re human and we all do things differently.”
Bell has refereed two previous Town matches, the 2-0 FA Cup replay defeat at Barrow in December 2021 and the 3-0 defeat at Northampton in April the same year.