No clash of interests, says selector Murphy

WELL-KNOWN intercounty referee Dickie Murphy has no intention of hanging up his whistle now that he has been appointed a selector with the Wexford senior hurling team.

“There should be no clash of interests,” the Enniscorthy postman said.

“It’s an opportunity I couldn’t turn down,” he said.

Murphy has joined John Conran and Martin Quigley as the trio charged with the responsibility of restoring the glory days to Wexford hurling.

The three were selectors together with the county’s under-21 team which failed against Cork in the 1997 All-Ireland semi-final.

Referring to his refereeing duties, Murphy said he does not envisage any problems.

“My first obligation will naturally be to the Wexford senior hurling team. But I don’t intend giving up refereeing.

“Under the system introduced two years ago, referees for provincial intercounty championship games come from outside the province. In regards to national league games, the policy now being adopted by the GAC is to use those games to blood new referees.

“Last year, I refereed only two league games over the entire campaign, so there shouldn’t be any difficulty next year in being an intercounty referee and a Wexford selector.”

Murphy is confident he and his colleagues can turn around the fortunes of the Model County during their two-year tenure.

“Looking back to the year gone by, there was only a puck of a ball between ourselves and Kilkenny in the Leinster final. Had we won that game, who knows how things would have turned out.

“Also, Wexford have won four Leinster Under-21 titles in the last six years and while no All-Ireland was added, Limerick beat us by a single point in the 2000 final in a game we had chances to win.

“We are confident there is talent within the county to be serious contenders next year, but we also realise there is a lot of work ahead of us in putting a winning team together.

“If someone told me a month ago I would be a Wexford senior hurling selector for 2003, I’d have laughed at him. But things have moved very fast in the last few weeks.

“Travelling around in the job, I’ve experienced nothing but good wishes from Wexford hurling people to our appointments. Hopefully we can get the county back up to the top of the ladder where we rightfully belong.

“The bottom line is that I’m not retiring from refereeing, either at county or national level, and hopefully there won’t be too many conflicts of interest over the next two years.”

Conran takes over from Tom Dempsey, who stepped down to concentrate on his political career. The Rathnure businessman holds eight county championship medals with his club, but lost three All-Ireland club championship finals.

Quigley is from a famous Rathnure hurling family, and after a successful playing career, became senior county coach.