A CENTRAL figure in the 2003 FA Cup final will be found in the less glamorous surroundings of the Southampton Saturday League Second Division tomorrow - and he couldn't be happier.

Keith Stroud, one of the two assistant referees at the Saints v Arsenal showpiece occasion, returns to his roots when he referees the clash between BTC Southampton Reserves and Malvern.

It's a far cry not only from the Millennium Stadium for Stroud, but also from the Football League matches he has been in charge of so far this season at Cheltenham, Swansea, Cambridge, Oxford and Shrewsbury.

The 34-year-old Dorset-based official, who also ran the line at last season's Arsenal v Manchester United FA Cup semi-final, is stepping out at BTC Sports Ground tomorrow for two good reasons.

The first is simply to fill one of the 400 weekly gaps in the Hampshire grass-roots football fixture list regarding the appointment of referees to games ranging from youth to small-sided to women's to adult soccer.

The second is more important - by taking charge of a typical Saturday afternoon local league match, the man who was appointed the Hampshire FA referees development officer in the summer can see for himself at first hand what many men in black have to go through every weekend.

As the Daily Echo has reported previously, that can involve verbal and physical abuse - though figures are currently showing a decrease in assaults based on a similar stage last season.

Stroud has run the line at a handful of Saints games at St Mary's and also refereed their 3-1 friendly defeat at Plymouth Argyle in late July which saw Paul Sturrock well beaten on his Home Park return.

There were over 10,000 pairs of eyes waiting for him to make a mistake that day; tomorrow there will be considerably less.

But Stroud confessed: "I'll be treating the game the same as the Plymouth one.

"You have to try and treat the players the same way - they're two sets of blokes out to enjoy playing a game they love.

"I will try and referee tomorrow's game as I normally do in the Football League.

"All referees are different, we all have different styles, and I like to talk to the players as much as I can - that's because of my lack of height.

"You alway get the odd one, but generally the professionals have been very receptive. I've had no controversy yet - no red cards!"

Stroud started refereeing in the local Bournemouth Leagues and was voted Wessex League referee of the year back in the late 1990s as he climbed the whistling ladder.

"This will be the first game I've refereed at a level like this for about 12 years," he said. "I'm really looking forward to it. It's a whole new experience for me - it will be like starting out all over again.

"Maybe I will make the odd mistake - that's the way it sometimes goes."

Tomorrow is no one-off for Stroud - he plans to referee at least one local league match in six different parts of the county as part of his grass-roots fact-finding mission.

Meanwhile, he will continue refereeing in the Football League's basement divisions - in the hope he can one day follow good friend Paul Durkin onto the Premiership list.

But all the while, the desperate bid to increase Hampshire's contingent of referees goes on.

It starts right at the bottom.

"We recently ran a course for 14 and 15-year-olds," he reported, "and last weekend around 13 of them were taking charge of Eastleigh & District Mini League matches. That's great to see.

"I'm a good example of what can be achieved if you start refereeing early enough.

"Not everyone who is interested in football is good at playing it and maybe we can persuade some of them to become referees."