Mac backs black card for hurling
SLAUGHTNEIL’S Karl Mckaigue has backed the introduction of the black card in hurling after his club’s All-ireland club semifinal defeat last Saturday.
The Derry champions lost at the penultimate stage for the second successive year, beaten by Limerick’s Na Piarsaigh despite leading by three points at half-time and playing the majority of the second half against 13 men.
However, there were two incidents in which Brendan Rodgers was hauled to the ground in either half that irked Mckaigue.
Slaughtneil converted the resultant penalty after the first foul but the second occurred outside the penalty area and a free was scant reward, with Slaughtneil chasing goals late on.
Mckaigue feels there may be some merit in adding the black card – which was introduced to Gaelic football in 2014 in a bid to discourage cynical play – to hurling.
Mckaigue, himself a dual club player and Derry footballer, said: “We got a penalty and scored it, but it was by no means a gimme that Cormac [O’doherty] was going to score the penalty. That one in the second half was just as blatant as you like.
“If it had have been a football game they would have been screaming and shouting for it.
“You do feel a wee bit hard done by because if Brendan was by that man, he was going to bury it in the net, simple as, but you know, cynicism is always going to be in games.
“It probably is creeping into hurling a wee bit more. Possibly it [a black card] is something for the hierarchy to look at.”