Brian Gavin: David Gough in pole position for All-Ireland football final
Mayo captain Aidan O'Shea with referee David Gough after the Connacht champions booked their spot in the All-Ireland final. Picture: Ray McManus/Sportsfile
Expected results in this weekend’s All-Ireland semi-finals but a strange couple of days, nevertheless.
Time seemed the big thing this weekend particularly in Saturday’s Dublin-Cavan game. So open an affair, it was 15 minutes before Ciarán Branagan blew for a free, something you rarely see in a game of football these days or from a referee trying to set out his stall.
Ciarán Kilkenny was at the heart of another timing incident. How he was allowed to take 23 seconds to kick his mark when the rule states he can only have 15 was not a good reflection on the referee.
Paddy Small took a similar amount of time composing himself for his kick. Sure, if you leak it to 16 or 17 seconds that’s fine but taking that amount of time should not be permitted.
The decision by Branagan not to black card Jonny Cooper for an entanglement with Martin Reilly seemed the right call.
Yes, Reilly tripped but it didn’t look intentional, more a coming together of the players’ legs and although Cooper did put out his hands and it was a free — 10 minutes in the sin bin would have been harsh.
At the other end, there was an obvious free not awarded to Kilkenny when it seemed his leg was being held and why that wasn’t given was a mystery. Almost all the yellow cards handed out looked good calls.
Killian Clarke deserved his for an off-the-ball incident with Dean Rock and Thomas Galligan’s first one was justified even if it seemed it was verbals with Ciarán that saw him pick up the second booking. Maybe that had something to do with Philly McMahon’s foul on Galligan not being picked up by Branagan. There was also a blatant foul on Conor Smith which was not called.
This was a great chance for Ciarán to go up the national referees ladder and I don’t think he took enough steps.
David Gough had it easier in the Mayo-Tipperary fixture with a lot of the yellow cards obvious such as Bill Maher’s and Pádraig O’Hora’s but what Cillian O’Connor got booked for though, I’m not sure. The black card for Lee Keegan was a stonewall one.
Brian Fox may have taken a couple more steps than he should have for his goal but there was good positioning by the umpires to adjudge it had crept over the goal line. Also, with Michael Quinlivan’s goal chance, it seemed he switched hands, something you rarely see when a player is going for goal. Had he found the net, it would be interesting to see if it would have been allowed.
I wasn’t too accurate with my prediction about the hurling final referee but Gough is still my favourite for Saturday week.
Conor Lane, Maurice Deegan and David Coldrick would all feel they have a chance too, although Seán Hurson’s chances diminished after the couple of mistakes he made at the end of the Connacht final.
Fergal Horgan is first up next Sunday, though, and news of his appointment spread on Monday but it wasn’t Friday before he was confirmed.
That was a mistake by the GAA who should have made the announcement as soon as it became known in Horgan’s Tipperary that he was going to be the man for the job.
Fergal did well in last weekend’s Waterford-Kilkenny semi-final but this is going to be a more intense game. He needs to get on his game early and if so he will then have a chance to release the flow of the game and then reel it back in when necessary.
Colm Lyons, who I thought would be appointed, is one of his linesmen. Colm did the Munster final between the counties and I don’t know whether that counted against him but it certainly shouldn’t have on the basis of his performance that day.
Fergal has never been shy about expressing himself and he would have been frustrated these last couple of years.
The last thing the GAA would want is an All-Ireland final referee stepping away.
Interestingly, Fergal’s appointment means only five referees will have taken charge of the last 13 All-Ireland finals.
That’s a huge worry and demonstrates either not enough refs are coming through or getting their chance — or both.
