HANDPASS RULE NOT GIVEN CHANCE: O SE
Three red cards and 11 yellows, but it’s Tyrone’s title yet again
KERRY legend Tomas O Se believes the GAA have missed a trick by binning a handpass limit.
Central Council have decided not to proceed with a three handpass limit trial for the football League after a backlash.
“It’s a mistake,” said O Se. “Managers, players, their goals are short term. But they [GAA’S Standing Committee on the Playing Rules] was challenged to look at the future of football.”
TYRONE and Armagh served up a throwback to the noughties with a cracking, if spiteful, Mckenna Cup decider which the Red Hands edged in the Athletic Grounds.
Armagh finished with 13 men and Tyrone with 14 after red cards to James Morgan, Aaron Mckay (both Armagh) and Ronan Mcnamee (Tyrone) all in the last 10 minutes.
Mckay and Mcnamee clashed off the ball and picked up straight reds in the 68th minute.
There were also 11 yellow cards (seven for Armagh) in a match which gripped the huge 11,318 crowd in a cracking atmosphere as Tyrone won this competition for the seventh time in eight years.
It had less to do with winning silverware – and more to do with a heated local rivalry.
The sides were level at 0-12 apiece after 57 minutes but Darren Mccurry’s 0-9, eight from frees, helped them over the line.
Armagh won a penalty when Kieran Mcgeary was judged to have touched Stefan Campbell’s goal-bound shot on the ground with five minutes of normal time to go and Armagh trailing by two.
But Rory Grugan’s kick clipped the top of the bar and went over for a point and Tyrone dug deep to claw out a win over their old rivals.
With Central Council scrapping the hand-pass rule earlier in the day, the game was free of the restricted three hand-pass experiment which had frustrated so many managers and players during the pre-season competitions.
Armagh, confident after backto-back wins over Monaghan and Donegal, started brightly and led 0-4 to 0-1 with Stefan Campbell slicing over the game’s first point from play after 11 minutes.
Darren Mccurry’s frees kept Tyrone in touch until Cathal Mcshane slotted over their first from play in the 21st minute.
That sparked a good run of scores for the Red Hands, the first of five in a row, with Niall Sludden getting on the end of two wellworked moves for fine points.
Four Armagh defenders were booked in the first half and things got heated just before the break with a spat that saw Aaron Mckay, Greg Mccabe (both Armagh) and Conall Mccann (Tyrone) all pick up yellow cards, as Tyrone went in with a 0-9 to 0-6 lead at half time.
Tyrone held that three-point cushion a few times in the second half as the game grew fractious.
Campbell scored the best point of the game, shaking off Mcnamee to send the ball sailing over and Niall Grimley was superb from frees for Kieran Mcgeeney’s side.
Morgan’s dismissal for two yellows left Armagh down to 14 and Tyrone never trailed in the last quarter.
Grugan clipped over a point to reduce it to 0-14 to 0-13 but that was as close as they got with Tyrone scoring two of the last three to start the year with silverware.