Brian Gavin: The lack of crowds could actually be beneficial for GAA referees
Clare’s Jack Browne is booked by Referee Fergal Horgan during yesterday's Munster Championship clash. Picture: INPHO/Ryan Byrne
With the amount of white flags being raised, hurling umpires were getting as much exercise as much as their referees over this opening weekend of the hurling championship.
People have their theories for the high scoring. John Kiely said after the game that it’s the speed of the puck-out and perhaps he’s right. What I noticed in both the game in Croke Park and Thurles was umpires not handing the sliotars to the goalkeepers as has been the norm. Instead, the players were picking up the balls from the ground to the side of their goals.
Now, that may be a Covid-19 directive, an understandable one too and it would lend to the goalkeepers getting the play going again quickly. However, with so many puck-outs comes a lot of whistles. Think about it, in Thurles there were 60 scores and about 17 or 18 wides. There were 18 frees. That’s an excessive amount of whistling, especially when there’s no crowd and you could gauge on social media just how annoying it was for a lot of people.
It might be an idea for Croke Park to direct that the referee need not blow for a puck-out to be taken. I know Fergal Horgan penalised Eibhear Quilligan for taking a couple too quickly but providing all the players are outside the 20-metre line should the goalkeeper be simply allowed to start play when he sees fit?
Not that referees will be entirely unhappy about there being no crowds. Their concentration levels are better without them. We’ve seen in recent years frees being given for the reaction of the crowd or a certain group of supporters in the stand than what has actually happened on the pitch.
But without them comes more pressure from management and players on referees to make calls.
I remember one of the last challenge games I did in Faithful Fields between Offaly and Limerick and the amount of frees the Limerick management were looking for was crazy. It being a challenge game, I wanted to let the hurling speak for itself and keep the whistling to a minimum. But now everyone is shouting for a free and it doesn’t matter if they have a case or not.
The yellow sliotar certainly hasn’t negatively affected the level of scoring but then is it really an improvement on the original white? The jury is still out on it for me and I will be chatting to match officials over the next couple of weeks to get their thoughts.
As for the game in Thurles, Fergal did well. The last couple of years, he has gone under the radar a bit despite being one of the finest referees around. And there is no doubt that he has changed his ways. He was very whistle-happy here when in the past he would have tended to let the game flow.
He probably overdid the frees a little bit but perhaps Croke Park have been on to him about getting tougher. He might have played advantage a bit more in Thurles but then it might have come to a stage where he wasn’t getting the bigger games and he felt he had to do something about it. He just needs to get the balance between the two right.
The yellow card decisions, you couldn’t say he was wrong with the vast majority of them. Rory Hayes, David McInerney and Gearóid Hegarty were all punished for hurleys around the necks although Stephen O’Halloran might have been a tad unfortunate to pick up one.
David Fitzgerald’s late pull across Graeme Mulcahy was a nasty one although technically it’s not a red card. The Clare keeper also seemed to be pulled for coming out of the rectangle with his puck-out and that might be a directive coming from Croke Park.
In Saturday’s game, the major talking point in an otherwise open and comfortable game for Paud O’Dwyer was Danny Sutcliffe’s deliberate trip. It’s probably going a bit far to say it should be a red but it was dangerous and when people talk about black cards in hurling this is what they think of.
Paud was right with his calls and when the players tired in the second half the fouling increased. He played a lot of good advantage and when it didn’t accrue called back the play. One foul he did miss was Davy Keogh’s loose hurl across Paddy Purcell.
Both Fergal and Paud passed the recent national referees fitness tests, which in my opinion have damaged the standard of match officiating. We’ve seen retirements and strong former All-Ireland final referees only making the panel at the second or third time of taking the test.
It has become so rigorous that you wonder if the powers-that-be prefer referees as fit as players to referees who actually know how to supervise a game. Rather than national tests, regional training, especially in this time of Covid, should be done to allow the referees come together once or twice a week.
Because right now the national exam is driving a wedge between good referees and the games. It’s completely turning off some of them and leading to stress. You had a situation earlier this week where a referee was appointed to take charge of the postponed U20 All-Ireland final only to be replaced because he hadn’t passed the test.Â
On another note, Tyrone’s Rory Brennan was handed 12 weeks for touching referee Jerome Henry in Ballybofey. You might tend to give him the benefit of the doubt but the Diarmuid Connolly case has set a precedent and Brennan was in the wrong. Especially in the context of Covid, you couldn’t have any sympathy for him.
