'I wanted to hit Ashley Cole in tunnel tear-up – my assistant had to hold me back'
Ex-Premier League referee Mark Halsey made his return to football after having cancer and was in no mood to hear legendary Chelsea full-back Ashley Cole's angry words towards him
Former Premier League referee Mark Halsey has revealed he once wanted to “f***ing lump” Ashley Cole.
Halsey officiated the top flight of English football 280 times between August 1999 and 2013. The 62-year-old took charge of some huge games, including Chelsea’s defeat to Tottenham in the 2008 League Cup final.
His sheer volume of games in charge meant there were bound to be instances where players didn’t agree with some of his decisions. And that was certainly the case during one game between Burnley and Chelsea at Turf Moor in the early-2010s.
Halsey revealed on the Undr The Cosh podcast that one of his calls had infuriated England and Blues legend Cole, causing the pair to almost come to blows.
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He explained: “I’d just come back from battling cancer. It was Burnley vs Chelsea and it was the first-half, I don’t know how many decisions I gave against Ashley. Something happened. He weren’t happy and we were walking all the way down the tunnel.
“He was effing me, I was effing and jeffing back at him. We were hammer and tongs at each other and I went like that [squared up] to him, and my own guy grabbed me and threw me back in the dressing room.
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“I just lost it. I thought, I f***ing nearly died and he’s talking to me like that. But I shouldn’t have brought that into it. Second-half, he came up to me and gave me a hug and I apologised. That was the end of it but it nearly ended up in…”
Halsey, who discovered he had Non-Hodgkin lymphoma in 2009, had to step away from the game for some time to remove the cancerous tumour in his throat. He made his inspirational return in March 2010, continuing his refereeing duties until the end of the 2012/13 season.
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He added that it was all water under the bridge with three-time Premier League winning left-back Cole, who approached him years later at a hotel about the incident.
“Do you remember the bust-up we had in the tunnel?” Cole said, before Halsey replied: “Do I remember it? I wanted to f***ing lump you!”