Hawk-Eye on the blink
In a statement last night, they said the technology is expected to be in operation again Sunday despite a bizarre incident in the first minute of the Galway-Limerick game in which referee Fergal Horgan referred to the score technology following a point attempt by Limerick’s Barry Nash.
Horgan had initially noted the first-minute effort as a score after one of his umpires raised a white flag but later ruled it out, having been contacted by the review official via his ear piece.
He then signalled for Hawk-Eye and while the word “miss” lit up the big Croke Park screen, the graphic that preceded it showed the trajectory of the ball had passed between the posts.
As per official protocol, referee Horgan would have also been informed by the review official that the ball had gone wide.
However, the confusion caused by the decision compelled the GAA to withdraw Hawk-Eye in the second half and for the senior semi-final between Clare and Limerick.
Unbeknownst to Horgan, that course of action was taken moments prior to the referee calling on Hawk-Eye a second time for another Limerick scoring decision.
The process was allowed to go ahead, with Hawk-Eye once again indicating that a Limerick shot had gone wide.
Munster champions Limerick lost the game in extra-time, 0-23 to 0-20, having scored an equaliser in the dying seconds of second-half injury-time in normal time.
On the first minute decision involving Nash, the GAA stated: “Following an inconsistency in the generation of a graphic by Hawk-Eye during today’s minor hurling semi-final, the decision was taken to suspend use of the score detection system for the senior game. A full review of the technology, in conjunction with Hawk-Eye, commenced this evening and its finding will be examined by the GAA tomorrow (today).
“It is expected that Hawk-Eye will be in full working order for next Sunday’s minor and senior football semi-finals.”
During the afternoon, GAA head of media relations Alan Milton explained why they took the decision to suspend use of the technology.
“We were unhappy with the generation of one of the graphics,” he told RTÉ. “There was an inconsistency during the minor game.
“To that end, we have decided to pull Hawk-Eye for the remainder of the day. We are taking the policy it is better to be safe than sorry in this instance. We are going to launch an internal investigation to try to get to the bottom of it to make sure it can be remedied before it will be in use again.
“For obvious reasons, if it is not perfect, we will not be using as part of match-day apparatus.”
With much fanfare, Hawk-Eye made its GAA debut in June this year in the Leinster SFC quarter-finals.
Sponsored by Specsavers, the cost of the technology to the GAA has never been revealed.
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