Referees and managers need to talk, says Gardiner

REFEREES' spokesman Fr Seamus Gardiner has accepted the need for greater communication between officials and managers on the implementation of rules.

Fr Gardiner believes regular meeting of managers, players and officials should be arranged to avoid a repeat of last weekend's fall-out and ill-feeling.

However, only three county managers, in both codes, attended one such meeting six weeks' ago.

"Communication between everyone is something that should be looked at. The mechanics of it would need to be worked out but I would say that the best time for a meeting would be before the championship."

Fr Gardiner believes the number of cards should be weighed against the volume of games as well as the fact that a handful of ties coughed up the majority of the sending-offs.

"There were 13 football games over the weekend. Someone pointed out to me there are a similar number every week in the league without anything like that many sendings-off but there is a far higher intensity to the championship, I would argue.

"I honestly didn't foresee any problems going into the weekend on the back of the (referees') meeting last Tuesday. You have to remember that there were a good few games where there were no red cards shown at all, but there was one with five and another with four."

The two games he was referring to were the all-Ulster ties between Down and Fermanagh and Armagh and Donegal.

"Is football in crisis? I don't think so. Some games are played in a negative manner, but although I haven't seen them myself, I've been told the two games in Croke Park were fantastic, positive games of football."