Clarke warns of football’s new diving habit

Armagh attacker Jamie Clarke has highlighted the issue of simulation in Gaelic football and claimed that it’s becoming a problem.

The experienced forward was red-carded for striking a Clare player during Armagh’s Allianz league Division 2 draw earlier this month.

Clarke contested the sanction, arguing at a Central Hearings Committee meeting that he accidentally hit the player in the chest with his elbow and that the player went to ground clutching his face.

Clarke was unsuccessful and served a one-match suspension last weekend when Armagh lost to Meath, a result that has dented their promotion hopes.

The 2017 All-Star nominee, who played for New York in last year’s Championship, claimed simulation is a growing problem in the game and admitted he wouldn’t be against making it a yellow card offence.

“For myself, it’s one of those things where it’s part of my game, I think most players throw the arm back to fend off a man and I suppose probably me being a bit naive in the modern game, he went down holding his face,” said Clarke at the launch of Bodibro High Performance Sportswear 2019 GAA range.

“I didn’t hit him in the face and that’s why I was appealing it. But the rules are the rules and the referee put it down as striking and there was no real argument from my point of view. I had to try to prove the referee wrong and I couldn’t.

I think it’s probably a bigger issue at the moment, that players are jumping to the ground once they get contact, you know.

Clarke was also sent off against Monaghan in the McKenna Cup last month following two bookings and said he was naive on that occasion too.

“I got two yellows in one of the games in the McKenna Cup and it was just from going in with the arm and players grabbing you and jumping to the ground, it’s just players being cute,” said the Crossmaglen man.

Asked if he believes that opposition teams are now deliberately targeting him because of his habit of using his arms while tackling, Clarke nodded.

“I would say that they are aware of it now, that the last couple of years it’s ‘if he throws the arm out, go down now’ or whatever,” said Clarke. “It’s for me to be aware of that type of thing.”

Clarke revealed the exchange between himself and the Clare player following the incident in Newry in Round 2 of the league.

I tackled him and I was kind of like, ‘get up off the ground’ because I had hit him in the chest and why I was appealing was because he went down holding his face, so I was like, ‘what are you doing?’ But it is what it is.

Armagh manager Kieran McGeeney claimed after the game that referee Cormac Reilly dismissed Clarke ‘for what looks like a man just holding his face and going down’.

Clarke said he likes the physicality of traditional GAA tackling and collisions and that he won’t be joining in the simulation.

“I don’t think I’ll do that, no,” he said.

“I just think the game is less physical if you know what I mean, you’re nearly afraid to go in for certain tackles.

"Even with the black card, you can get done for a black card in the first five minutes for making a genuine effort to go for the ball so you just have to be wary of it.”

Clarke said he wouldn’t be against a yellow card for simulation being introduced, as in soccer.

“It’s possibly a way of getting rid of it,” he said.

“Look, it’s not something I want to drag on about, or chat about over and over again.

"I don’t want to be seen to be overly complaining about it but I do think it’s an issue to be honest.”