‘I’ve never witnessed anything like the scenes at the final whistle’

IN MORE years than I’d want to admit watching and reporting on Gaelic games, I’ve never witnessed anything like the scenes at the final whistle of Wednesday night’s game in Ennis.

Scary is the first word that comes to mind and it’s as good as any when you see grown men so full of hatred for the match official Jason O’Mahony (Limerick) whose late controversial decision denied Clare what could have been a first ever win in the grade.

While it’s easy to understand Clare’s frustration and anger at being “robbed” of victory, the truth is O’Mahony was correct in his application of the rule.

On a glorious night for hurling, 11,287 spectators, the vast majority of them from the Banner County, packed into the venue in anticipation of a first every victory at this level.

The home side matched the favourites score for score and there would have been few cribs had the game gone to a replay.

Regrettably, that was not the case, and not for the first time this Championship season, a match official became the centre of attention.

He’s an easy victim in these circumstances. But this year it’s been very noticeable the number of unfamiliar referees appointed to hurling and football games.

That stems from an obvious drive to recruit new whistlers. But gaelic games have become so professional now, at every level, that the least teams should expect is an experienced official, particularly when it comes to a final.

I remember giving a talk to referees many years ago, and the one thing I kept coming back to was the use of common sense, something the late, legendary Con Murphy emphasised to me when I refereed for the county board back in the 1960s.

“Don’t set out to be the centre of attraction”, he advised. “Try and be the most inconspicuous person on the field of play. That won’t be easy, but if use common sense you’ll find it will keep you out of trouble most times.”

Jason O’Mahony set his stall out early by penalising the Clare goalkeeper for stepping outside the small parallelogram. There was no argument from the Clare netminder about that decision and it should have put their goalkeeper on his guard.

The game developed into one of the best in the grade for years and the only quibble when five minutes of additional time was announced was the possibility of a loser. The five minutes drew gasps of amazement from the fans who wondered where the referee got all that additional time. Again to be fair to the referee he appeared to stop the watch every time a player went down injured and there were several instances of that in the second half.

With a minute of the five left to play the Clare goalkeeper Donal Tuohy took his umpteenth puck out and there was no signal from the umpire that Tuohy had committed an infringement.

Play continued in the Tipp half of the field where Nicky O’Connell won a free straight in front of the Tipperary goal and a massive roar went up from the home crowd as history beckoned. Clare had replaced their free taker Caimin Morey earlier and the chance to become the hero fell to substitute Conor Tierney.

Surely he couldn’t miss from 20 metres out dead straight in front of the posts? We’ll never know.

It became evident that the referee’s attention had been drawn by one of his linesmen to an umpire with a hand up.

After consulting with the umpire, O’Mahony cancelled the Clare free, awarded Tipp a 65 against the Clare ‘keeper for stepping outside the small square and Pa Bourke duly converted to give his side victory.

What followed was unsavoury, no other word for it.

The umpire, who made the massive call, was jostled as he made his way off the field, and both he, the referee and the rest of the match officials had to receive a garda escort.

Huge embarrassment was caused to Munster Council chairman Jim O’Gorman who was booed every time he went to address the crowd at the presentation. Such behaviour by the irate Clare followers will surely cost their county board a substantial fine when the Council come to deal with the referee’s report.

For referee O’Mahony it was a hard lesson is the failure to use common sense.

If he did not immediately recognise the umpire’s call for the square infringement, he should have allowed play to go on, and ignored his umpire.

Hard though it is to imagine, it could have been uglier.

What if he had allowed Clare take their lead free, and then cancelled the score to revert to the infringement at the other end.

Now that doesn’t bear thinking about.