MICHAEL DUIGNAN ON A WEEK OF FARCE IN HURLING
IF there is a forgotten man this week in the fall-out to the Waterford-Cork semifinal and the Austin Gleeson affair, it’s his team-mate Conor Gleeson. Like the Hurler of the Year, he did something stupid. Rather than pulling another player’s helmet off his head like Austin on Luke Meade, he gave Patrick Horgan a silly little tap with the hurley when his team were leading by seven points. It was foolish. And now he is the player set to miss out on an AllIreland hurling final.
Plenty of normally sane people were up in arms looking for Austin Gleeson to get off. But not a word about Conor who did far less. I feel for him and his family, and what they’ll have to go through if his suspension is upheld.
I know all about going through an emotional wringer when it comes to an All-Ireland semi-final. I pulled a stroke when we were 10 down against Clare in 1998 and should have been sent off. I can still remember the sense of dread wondering whether I’d escape punishment and the subsequent sense of relief.
I feel so sorry for the chap. There hasn’t been a balanced debate at all about whether he deserves to be suspended for a tap on the shin when Horgan was sent off for his part in the same incident.
Did it really merit James McGrath getting involved as linesman and issuing instruction to match referee James Owens that saw both players red-carded?
If Conor Gleeson misses an All-Ireland final for that, it will be ludicrous. A straight red card should be for something deliberate or nasty. Compared to a lot of what goes on in the game, it was innocuous.
I know it’s unlikely but I hope it’s rescinded.
I felt the GAA’s Central Competitions Control Committee behaved in a very disingenuous manner to Owens. It left him in a horrible position and then hung him out to dry. It’s my understanding that he hadn’t mentioned the incident with Austin Gleeson in his report. Just like referee Barry Kelly the previous Sunday in relation to Adrian Tuohy’s helmet pull on Patrick ‘Bonner’ Maher that saw the Tipperary man’s helmet removed, he received an email asking him to look again at it.
Kelly said he had adjudicated on it and that was that. I believe Owens was asked a couple of times on the Gleeson-Meade incident until he said he had adjudicated on it.
Why did the CCCC then make it known that it was unhappy with the verdict, as reported on RTÉ? Laying the blame almost at Owens’ door when it is the GAA’s own procedures that are ultimately at fault?
It shouldn’t be left to a referee to retrospectively ensure a player misses an All-Ireland final.
Why wasn’t he asked about other stuff that went on in the game?
Is The Sunday Game or social media setting the disciplinary agenda? It’s a valid question.
If you say Austin Gleeson’s actions merited punishment, you’re castigated.
I’m delighted that a player of his talent will get to grace hurling’s greatest stage but it shows the need for an independent citing commission. Expanding the powers of the CCCC is another option but you have members on it who have various county loyalties and might be under pressure to lean a certain way.
An independent body of, say, three people would remove that possibility. It could only work at inter-county level, but I do think the time has come for it. The stakes are too high.
In saying all of that, players must take responsibility for their actions. They are training so hard and putting so much into it so why leave yourself open to suspension?
I think the rule regarding helmet or faceguard interference is very important, there has been a 60% reduction in all facialrelated injuries since the faceguard was introduced.
Tadhg de Búrca’s case from the quarter-final was more down to interpretation – I felt it wasn’t deliberate and the decision was harsh – but the incidents involving Gleeson and Stephen Bennett in the Munster Championship were far more clear cut.
There are strict guidelines on the type of helmet allowed. In my view, a lot of the problems are being caused by the modification of the faceguard. Players buy a particular brand and take a bar out to make it easier to see the ball, or get a different one put on.
This is where the GAA needs to crack down. At ordinary level in rugby and soccer, the referee checks players’ studs before the game, to ensure unnecessary injury to opponents.
The same thing should happen with helmets. If a player is coming on, his should be checked by the fourth official. Same as happens with gumshields.
We all played in old times when there was a harder edge to the game. How did we survive? It was a different game. Players are so fit, so strong with all the gym work, and the collisions are a big thing now because of how the game has evolved tactically.
After a week of controversy, hopefully the game will now take centre stage. Galway have a near-30-year famine to deal with, along with the extremely sad loss of Tony Keady and the emotion involved in the planned minute’s applause during next month’s All-Ireland decider.
Waterford’s wait goes all the way back to 1959. A hugely exciting, unique pairing.
Whoever wins it, it will be momentous.