Laois will not contest Fitzpatrick sending-off

THERE will be no Laois appeal against the controversial dismissal of wing-back Kevin Fitzpatrick in Sunday’s Leinster SFC final.

While he repeated his annoyance yesterday with the decision by referee Seamus McCormack, manager Mick O’Dwyer accepted that it would be “a waste of time”.

“I don’t think there is any point in appealing, when you see Gregory McCartan getting four weeks for throwing the ball at his opponent. He was tripped first of all and the fellow who tripped him got away,” he said.

“In fairness, Kevin’s sending-off was hard. He is an extremely clean footballer. When he went for the ball he was ahead of Tadhg Fennin, but with Fennin’s pace he got there just that second before. There was no malice, no intention of doing damage.”

Overall, O’Dwyer feels that at times yellow cards are shown unnecessarily and that often they can have harmful consequences.

“They generally give a yellow card to a player at the start, by the way to quieten him. But what they actually do, they finish him.

“Pauric Clancy got one after about five minutes on Sunday. It destroyed him for the rest of the game because he was pulling back from going challenging, for the ball, everything.

“If he collided with a guy in the air, with the way the game has gone he’d get another yellow card and he’d be gone. It’s crazy.”