Brian Gavin: After 25 frees, eight yellows, a black and a red, Clare and Limerick must look at themselves — not the ref
LINE OF FIRE: Tony Kelly of Clare speaks to referee Michael Kennedy before his side were awarded a penalty during the Munster GAA Senior Hurling Championship Round 3 match between Clare and Limerick at Zimmer Biomet Páirc Chíosóg in Ennis, Clare. Pic: Brendan Moran/Sportsfile
In Cork last Sunday, we had 16 frees whistled. In Ennis, we had 25, eight yellow cards, a black and a red.
This was Michael Kennedy’s first Munster senior championship game but it wasn’t a case of him being overzealous or anything of the sort. The players have to look at themselves and probably the coaches too.
The indiscipline was on the part of the teams throughout. It took Kennedy some time to get up to the tempo of the game but when he did, he had full control.
Diarmaid Byrnes met Shane O’Donnell with a tackle early on and caught the Clare forward square on the shoulder and Kennedy played on correctly, although O’Donnell needed treatment following it.
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Adam Hogan was rightly black carded and Limerick given a penalty when he brought down Shane O’Brien in the first half. This was the exact kind of foul that the black card and penalty was introduced for.
Shane O’Donnell was yellow carded for a frontal challenge, but Clare supporters could have reason to give out that Mark Rodgers wasn’t awarded a penalty when his jersey was pulled by Seán Finn.
In defence of Kennedy, those incidents can often be difficult to see but there was no doubt Rodgers was hard done by as his goal attempt was kept out by Nickie Quaid at the same time.
In the second half, David McInerney was booked immediately after being introduced when he clashed with Shane O’Brien. The Limerick forward was lucky not to be yellow carded himself but later picked up one for a foul on Diarmuid Stritch.
Adam English was sent off for two yellow cards, the first of them for a wild pull on Peter Duggan and the second a mistimed tackle on Stritch.
Some Clare folk might have felt Barry Nash, already booked, should have been carded and in turn sent off when he gave away the penalty for fouling Tony Kelly but he held him up. He didn’t trip, pull down Kelly or carelessly use his hurl to stop him, which are the three fouls that warrant a black. The penalty was the correct decision.
Things calmed down for Kennedy in the second half and he should learn a lot from an intense fixture when there were more questions about the players than him.
The events on Sunday had a lot to live up to after what occurred in Armagh on Saturday evening. With six seconds left before the hooter sounded, Monaghan won a lineball and didn’t seem to panic as they knew they had the time to kick it whatever happened.
A two-pointer would force extra-time and as per the rule they didn’t have to rush it. However, Noel Mooney called full-time and deemed the game to be over before he was approached by a remonstrating Rory Beggan and a calmer Monaghan team-mate David Garland.
Garland has refereed in Dublin and umpired for Martin McNally so he and Mooney would have probably known each other. And it was with this conversation going on, probably with a word in his earpiece too that he had made a mistake, that Mooney reversed his decision.
And so Jack McCarron was permitted to kick what turned out to be an outrageous two-point sideline kick, but a score that paved the way for one of Monaghan’s most famous championship victories.
It was healthy to see Mooney first of all being corrected and secondly realising the error of his ways and changing his mind on the spot. The thoughts of what would have happened had he not done so are not worth considering. It was an example of what can happen with the amount of rules and technicalities that referees have to deal with during a game.
If you were to be really technical, you would say McCarron’s planting right foot was on the line when he curled over that beautiful score but it wasn’t copped by the officials.
