Neil Warnock has joked that Mike Dean is retiring "10 years too late", with the English head coach getting in one last dig at the Premier League referee amid reports that he is hanging up his whistle at the end of the season.
Dean has served as a referee at the highest level of English football for the past 22 years, becoming a divisive figure among supporters and managers alike for his at-times controversial decision making.
The 53-year-old is reportedly set to retire this summer and take up a role in the VAR studio, and Warnock believes he has already overstayed his welcome.
What's been said?
The former Sheffield United and Cardiff City manager had plenty of run-ins with Dean during his two separate stints in the Premier League and, although he respects the official's knowledge of the game, he also feels that he is too often guilty of putting himself at centre-stage.
“[It’s] ten years too late! That’s the problem, it’s not going to help me, is it?" Warnock said on talkSPORT.
“I haven’t got time to go through the ones he’s given me over the years, but don’t forget I’m always with a little club so Mike, like some of the other referees, tends to go with the bigger clubs.
“Listen, he’s as good as anything. He has great games and I look at him and think that he doesn’t have to do what he does.
“He almost does things in a game to put himself out there when he doesn’t have to.
“’A good referee was never seen, my dad used to say to me, and he could referee like that, but he always has to do that extra bit for some reason to get himself in the limelight.
“Overall he’s a very good referee. He knows everything about it, but he just gets carried away.”
Asked if he'd like to see Dean continue working behind the scenes for the VAR team, Warnock replied: “Oh I hope so. It’d be lovely for me to watch him from afar with all of these other managers in the studio. I’d recommend it.
“If Mike Dean did it they’d probably change the VAR so that they’ve got a television camera on him all the way through the judgement!”
Dean's Premier League record
Dean, who is reportedly in line to star in the 2022 edition of popular TV show 'I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here!', has taken charge of 554 top-flight games over the course of his refereeing career.
The English official is the only man to pass 500 Premier League games and holds the record for the highest number of yellow and red cards shown.
114 red cards have been dished out by Dean to date, and that total could yet increase as he is scheduled to take charge of several more fixtures between now and the end of the 2021-22 campaign.