Former Mayo boss Peter Leahy wants Ladies rulebook to tackle 'cynical' play of Dublin

While the ladies football rulebook lists a number of fouls that warrant a yellow card and 10 minutes in the sin-bin, there are a number of other fouls that players can commit more than once before a referee is obliged to send a player to the sin-bin.

Mayo manager Peter Leahy. Picture:INPHO/Morgan Treacy

Former Mayo ladies football manager Peter Leahy has said the LGFA rulebook requires a drastic overhaul to stamp out what he terms the 'cynical' play of five-in-a-row chasing Dublin.

Leahy believes the game of ladies football is evolving at an incredible pace and that female inter-county players would be better served if the LGFA adapted more of the GAA playing rules to the women’s game.

One of Leahy’s chief bugbears is how the LGFA rulebook allows for cynical play, which he claims is being exploited by reigning All-Ireland champions Dublin. The four-in-a-row champions are in All-Ireland semi-final action this Saturday against Leahy’s former Mayo charges.

While the ladies football rulebook lists a number of fouls that warrant a yellow card and 10 minutes in the sin-bin, including a deliberate pull down or trip, high tackle, charging of an opponent with the shoulder to the upper body, and use of threatening or abusive language, there are a number of other fouls that players can commit more than once before a referee is obliged to send a player to the sin-bin.

Among the fouls that do not constitute a sin-binning, unless repeated, are pushing or holding an opponent, third player tackle, body-checking an opponent, and impeding an opponent.

Speaking after Donegal’s All-Ireland quarter-final defeat to Dublin, Donegal manager Maxi Curran said “today just proved that it’s profitable to foul”.

Leahy has called for the removal of the two-tick practice and said all cynical fouls should automatically warrant a yellow card and 10 minutes in the sin-bin.

“For certain fouls, the referee can only give you a tick. If you foul again, he'll give you a second tick, and then with the third tick you are off for 10 minutes. But the sport and the coaches are evolving quicker than the actual rules are," Leahy insisted.

“The game has got faster and it is more difficult to officiate, and that brings in cynicism. There are managers that would have a problem with how cynical the Dubs are, they stop you very early so you don't get a run on them. They'll take a ticking rather than let a team get a run on them.

“The reality is it is cynical but it is within the rules because you can take two tickings before you get sin-binned, so you can take two cynical fouls, move on, the next person does it, and it stops the opposition from getting into a flow.

Does that help the game? It doesn't help the game, but it is within the rules so it is the rules that have to change, more so than the officiating.

Leahy added: “I would never whinge about what Mick (Bohan) is doing, he is doing a brilliant job, and it is everyone else’s job to catch up.” 

The aforementioned Dublin manager recently said the rules governing the game are not “fit for purpose” and that the tackle “is still ambiguous at best”. The rulebook states “there shall be no deliberate body contact” and that “a player while holding the ball into her body cannot be legally dispossessed”.

Leahy is in favour of the rules governing the tackle in the men’s game being applicable to ladies football also.

“Female inter-county players are putting in the same effort and the same hours as the men, their conditioning has never been better, but they are being done a disservice by these rules.”