Legal eagle Logan puts GAA's 'nod and wink' disciplinary system in the dock
Feargal Logan, also Queen's University manager, at the draw of this year's Electric Ireland GAA Higher Education Championships in Croke Park. Photo by Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile
This isn’t Feargal Logan’s Howard Beale moment. This is not a breakdown. But he’s mad as hell, he thinks you should be too, and he doesn’t think people should take it anymore.
It wasn’t that it was Jim McGuinness, a manager of a rival county of Tyrone’s, that escaped punishment for pushing a player. It was that a manager avoided sanction when it was obvious an infraction had been committed.
And he’s worried. He’s worried about the precedent it has set when it undermined the one the Central Competitions Control Committee (CCCC) set in handing Ger Brennan a 12-week ban at the end of March. He’s worried that they have undermined their authority.
Logan doesn’t lack self-awareness. In his 30 or so years representing parties in a voluntary capacity in the GAA disciplinary system, he has succeeded in quashing proposed suspensions such as his fellow Tyrone man Ryan McMenamin’s 21 years ago.
“There’ll be people who'll say, ‘Oh, he's the man who started the law in this game’. I didn't start the law in the game. I just happened to be a lawyer, and I would like to think (former GAA director general) Páraic Duffy and others would say that I've tried to discreetly rescue and deal with situations across the Association without a fuss.”
But he’s quintessentially a GAA man. One who was an All-Ireland senior finalist in 1995. One who was his club Stewartstown Harps’ player-manager when they reached the 2005 All-Ireland junior final. One who managed his county to U21 All-Ireland success 10 years later and senior glory with Brian Dooher in 2021.
As good a history lesson as he can give on Tyrone GAA, he can provide just as sharp a timeline of the organisation’s disciplinary matters.
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“I've lived the journey from when if the writing paper upon which you lodged your appeal wasn't 100% guaranteed Irish, that was enough to rule it out of order to avoid dealing with difficult situations.
“I went through a phase of things being sub judice, which was skillfully used. And I've lived the journey of the absolute 100% cast-iron position that the referee's report is correct in all matters of fact and can never be challenged. Then to the point that if there is unedited video evidence or serious unfairness or compelling other evidence, then on a request for an oral hearing, then a hearings committee will look at the other evidence.
“There has been an evolution of the Treoir Oifigiúil (Official Guide), building in some fairness across all those decades that I've been involved with it.”
The rulebook has its idiosyncrasies of course, which Logan notes. “It's a long time since Jimmy Treacy, who's one of the most respected GAA men in Tyrone, a trustee of the association, said to me as a young, wide-eyed lawyer, ‘Feargal, self-defence is retaliation in the GAA rulebook.’ And I get that to a degree, right, although at the time as a fresh-faced young legal eagle, I was trying to rail against that a bit.”
The latest element of the system came 21 years ago with the introduction of the Disputes Resolution Authority, hailed by Logan as a “shining light ahead of its time in terms of disciplinary matters, governing associations, governing bodies, and fair procedures.”
In the facility of the DRA and the Treoir Oifigiúil, a document he describes as “diligent and skilfully crafted”, Logan trusts. But as good as they are, they can be undermined.
“The nod and a wink culture and the double-speak. I have lived the experience on a number of occasions, but some very starkly. The combination of the governing committees or bodies and referees.
“It's one thing an association that doesn't have the courage to enforce its own rules. That would undermine the integrity of everything, so there's no point complaining about the rulebook or the guides or the codes or this, that and the other.
“It's another level of concern when a governing body picks and chooses when to enforce its rules. For my money, that is a wholly more difficult and dangerous situation to allow to prevail.
“That shreds the integrity of matters, and here's the real rub for me – and I listen to all the malcontents and have lived with them over 30 years or so. It causes serious disillusionment and discontent at grassroots level. And then there's an over-enthusiasm on other occasions to enforce, and that creates a culture of disillusionment and discontent and challenges authority every time.”
Logan doesn’t buy the reported CCCC’s explanation for the decision not to suspend McGuinness. “I anticipate they're saying, ‘Well, the referee dealt with all matters.’ Now, that's a fig leaf. And that is a complete Pontius Pilate to stand behind and say, ‘Oh, well, the Treoir Oifigiúil doesn’t allow us to do x…’ It's a charade.
“Any type of physical interference with a player or opposition official, that is clear and unambiguous in its drafting. As someone who's patrolled a lot of sidelines, anyone who engages physically with an opposition player is opening themselves up, open season. It should be game on, and you wouldn't expect to survive the match if you take on opposition players in my book. I think it's a total, total, total no-no.”
The decision was made starker by the suspension issued to Brennan for pulling a Galway coach’s earpiece at half-time in the Dublin-Galway Division 1 final round game in Salthill in March.
“Ger Brennan is sitting on his hands for 12 weeks,” says Logan. “It wasn't a player that he engaged with. The Dubs are the ones who have probably benefited most out of this sort of culture that has arisen within the rulebook and the enforcement of it.
“But I think they have the Dubs at a weak point now. And Ger obviously isn't five All-Irelands in here and happened to think, ‘We’ve got to do this.’ So, I have a degree of sympathy for Ger Brennan, but should I be sympathetic towards the Dubs?”
If McGuinness’s situation is raised, then Clifford’s leading elbow on Caolan McGonagle last Saturday must be discussed too. But Logan can separate them. “The players are always up and at it, and he (Clifford) always lifts his elbow up after he shoulders. I nearly would disregard all that but when a manager steps over the line to interfere with an opposition player, and I'm not being sanctimonious here, I'm not being righteous, I'm just being realistic.
“To use sort of another phrase that pops up in legal circles, it drives a coach and horses through the enforcement of the rulebook and the application of it, and it leads for very dangerous waters ahead.”
Logan recalls how in January 2024 McGuinness was banned for eight weeks for playing Finnbarr Roarty in a McKenna Cup game against Armagh. Roarty was on the cusp of turning 18 but was illegal when he played.
Donegal contested the ban to the Ulster Council’s hearings committee who found that the infraction was unproven and the penalty was revoked. But their decision put the provincial body in an awkward place with Croke Park. The person in authority in such situations is the manager.
“Jimmy, I've always found to be good and sound and sensible within reason. He's obviously at the extreme edge of things in terms of how he deals with some things. But the Ulster Council did try and discipline Jimmy a couple of years ago.
“Jimmy was off doing soccer around the world for the guts of 10 years. I'm not sure when the underage rule was introduced into the rules, but from my memory, he was to be disciplined for playing an under-age footballer who's now a prominent footballer.
“The perception of that up here at the time was the Ulster Council rolled over and they actually began to recreate or redraft a rule about who actually is in control of the team. So, the inconsistent application of rules is the major thing.”
Logan knows exactly how the CCCC’s inaction this week is going to filter down to club level. “Football and hurling are the most important of the least important things in life. I've borrowed that possibly from a Liverpool mentor.
“We must always keep in mind that overall aspect of things. What I try to keep in mind is that this is an association for which we all care. We all acknowledge and accept the societal benefits that the GAA brings to us.
“But we must remember, and this is difficult to reconcile with the financial metrics and the slickness of the Association that, at its core, technically, it's an amateur sporting association.
“We live in this parallel universe that this is the absolute of everything. I'm guilty of that too, but when I put that across the desk to some of the malcontents I can tell you Jimmy McGuinness’ name will be mentioned and they'll say, ‘Well, frig the lot of them, Feargal.’”
Logan again stresses this isn’t personal. “I don't want to be going after Jimmy. I don't want to be going after Donegal people. I'll be up there (holidaying) for all of July, hopefully. But I do want people to understand that you can't just pick and choose the way it's gone on.”
Logan would much prefer to be talking about Tyrone’s U20 All-Ireland final against Kerry on Saturday. It was greatly appreciated when Kerry manager Tomás Ó Sé and Darragh paid their respects at Frank McGuigan’s wake earlier in the week. But Saturday is different.
“Tomás must be under serious pressure, and he must be putting himself under serious pressure,” says Logan. “Because there's a low tolerance around the Kingdom, from my view of it, from this distance, when you get to the business end of football and you don't deliver.”
In that game and other championship games going forward, there will be ramifications from events in Killarney last Saturday. Match officials have been instructed to keep a tighter rein on sideline numbers.
Logan envisages the GAA feeling the aftermath of that game for some time to come. “It’s got consequences for the Association.
“Centrally, they might be saying ‘we’ll ride this one out’ but society in its current form, the populism and social media and whatever, these things erode and corrode. We have seen other pillars of society tumble too and there is just a feel of that.”
To fortify the disciplinary process, Logan is in favour of widening its independence. “Rugby’s citing system is worth looking at in my view. If we are ‘the most democratic sports organisation’, we have to find a more objective way of applying this rulebook.”
And that’s where Logan leaves it. Unleashed. As Beale said, “What’s wrong with being an angry prophet?”
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