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The 42
3 days ago
- Sport
- The 42
Paying referees could be best way to improve quality of officiating
WE FOUND OURSELVES as referee of an U13 Gaelic football league game in Meath recently. It's a lottery most weeks whether an official ref is appointed, so when needs must a mentor who holds an Award 1 coaching credential can fill in. So it was that we were thrust into activity for Division 3 rough and tumble. The amount of incidents to adjudicate on, from lunging tackles, clean pick ups and dodgy hand-passes, to whether the requisite number of players were in either half of the pitch, to the scoring arc, to score-taking and substitutions, was head spinning. At one stage, while quickly checking on a player's welfare after a collision, an incident occurred out of our view which drew outrage among the visiting support behind the wire. We hadn't seen a bit of it. The linesman offered no input. We threw the ball up and restarted play. One half of the assembled parents lost their mind. Afterwards, we needed a lie down. Natasha Barton / INPHO Natasha Barton / INPHO / INPHO So we approach the issue of refereeing with nothing but admiration for those who do it week in, week out – particularly hurling refs. Approaching the half-way point of the hurling Championship, we've already torn through a squadron of them, highlighting their errors and inconsistencies. Michael Kennedy, for example, shouldn't have awarded Dublin their ghost goal against Wexford and Colm Lyons probably should have dished out at least one red card to a Galway player last weekend. Advertisement Waterford manager Peter Queally was critical too of Johnny Murphy in the Deise's loss to Cork last Sunday, saying they were 'very disappointed with a lot of' his decisions. In camogie, Tipperary were denied a place in the Munster final because Karen Kennedy's late goal, when the ball hit the net and flew back into play, wasn't given. The list goes on, prompting Dónal Óg Cusack to claim on The Sunday Game at the weekend that 'one of the biggest problems we have in the game is the standard of refereeing'. He too began from a starting point of acknowledging that refereeing can be a thankless task and that, without refs, there'd be no games. The former Cork goalkeeper suggested bringing in 'some sort of technology' to help. But refs would still have to make their own calls around hand-passing. Was it a throw or a perfectly executed pass with the most minimal of hand contact? It's nearly impossible to know. "One of the biggest problems that we have in the game is the standard of refereeing" Dónal Óg Cusack discusses what could be done to up the standard of officiating in hurling 📺 Watch #TheSundayGame live - — The Sunday Game (@TheSundayGame) May 25, 2025 There is a clear move too in the game, particularly among the top teams, to leave as much as possible in the tackle. The hits are bigger and harder than ever before. Which only adds to the referee's decision-making workload. As ex-ref Brian Gavin put it in the Irish Examiner on Monday of this week, 'There could have been four red cards in Parnell Park' last weekend, instead of none. Adding a second referee is a possible solution. But there is a lack of match officials as it is, and would Lyons' decisions last weekend, for example, have been any different with a second ref in the other half of the pitch? Probably not. So what about an alternative solution – how about throwing money at the problem? How would refereeing at the very elite level look if they were being paid, say, €500 a game for their services? Fergal Horgan, who refereed the 2017 All-Ireland senior hurling final, noted in 2020 that 'a lot of people think referees are getting paid. We get absolutely nothing for refereeing above in Croke Park – only 50 cent a mile from Tipperary to Croke Park and home. €120 for the day, and we're gone at 10 in the morning and home at 10 at night'. With a clearly defined, attractive, match fee to aspire to, the amount of energetic, savvy young GAA members looking to get into refereeing would surely increase from a trickle to a steady stream. And, in time, with greater numbers would come greater quality. There is no inherent suggestion that the current panel of Championship referees aren't fully invested in what they do. It is a lifestyle choice for them as much as it is for players. But by increasing the attractiveness of the position, in the form of a substantial payment for those who make it to a high level, surely the quality of the candidate increases too. It may even be enough to bring former inter-county players to the refereeing table. The GAA, in modern times at least, has never been able to crack that one and to get top players to view refereeing as a credible option after inter-county retirement. The referees' lot has improved somewhat in recent seasons. A portion of their gym fees are paid. They receive a €250 boot voucher every second year. County refs also have access to a counsellor and a sports and exercise psychologist. But, truth be told, it still comes across as a most unattractive proposition to many. Adopting the capitalist principle that by sweetening the reward you improve the output, would be an interesting path to go down. And the better the ref, the bigger the games they get. Paid up professionals are producing stunning returns in other areas of the GAA. Like Croke Park Ltd returning record turnover for 2024 of almost €60m. An army of coaches throughout the country are paid for their valuable services too. What they all do is considered a necessity. So is the work of referees which is fundamental to the smooth running of the entire playing calendar. We recently stumbled across a column which was written in 2017 for The Longford Leader newspaper by their then columnist Mattie Fox, aghast at how little referees were both appreciated and invested in. 'The minimum paid to a referee for inter-county games should be €500 plus travel costs, plus proper food for their umpires,' he wrote. 'That's the absolute minimum. For an All-Ireland, or All-Ireland semi-finals, or provincial finals, the very minimum should be €1000, plus expenses.' It would make for an interesting and, surely, improved inter-county landscape.
The 42
15-05-2025
- Sport
- The 42
Goals powered Tipperary to defining win - now they seek to maintain progress
LIAM CAHILL ALLUDED to the importance of victory in Ennis post-match last Saturday night. For Tipperary. For the players. And for his tenure as manager. The Ballingarry man was appointed for a three-year term in 2022. The path forward, he admitted, has been difficult to navigate. He has threaded the needle between a declining golden generation and a coming influx of underage talent. But wins were necessary to knit it all together. Since the opening-day triumph over Clare in 2023, there hadn't been any more joy in Munster. Not that they had been far away either. Four draws were dotted among the five losses. But in year three, the fruits of progress had to be seen. 'Today was probably a defining game for our season. For me as well, it was important through my term at the moment, that the green shoots continued to prosper today,' said Cahill. Tipp are in no way back, Cahill insisted, after their draw with Limerick. And they have plenty of issues that remain a work in progress. Still, winning in Clare showed signs of rediscovering their identity. Advertisement The way in which Cahill signalled to his forwards to keep going for goals echoed Eamon O'Shea's exhortation of 'Attack! Attack! Attack!' before the 2010 All-Ireland final. In his debut year, Cahill was in the happy position of fielding a clutch of media queries about his goal-hungry attack. It was something they practised, he said. Tipperary manager Liam Cahill shakes hands with Clare manager Brian Lohan after last Saturday's game. Natasha Barton / INPHO Natasha Barton / INPHO / INPHO Something they needed to reach the 30-point barrier required for victory. Something for spectators, too, breaking the monotony of distance shooting. In 2019, his U20 All-Ireland champions machine-gunned 19 goals in four games. In his debut year with the seniors, they raised 29 green flags across league and championship, averaging 2.4 per game. In the following year's championship, however, Tipp netted just twice in four games. Something was broken. Their deliveries weren't getting through. The conditioning required for their running game didn't seem right. Their forwards weren't playing close enough to goal. John McGrath hadn't started for Tipp since that five-goal blitz against Clare in '23. He has been reborn in 2025 with braces against Limerick and the Banner. That provided a lifejacket against the Treaty. John Kiely's men had shut out Tipp in the 2023 league semi-final and both of their previous round-robin meetings. McGrath's well-timed goals warded off the trademark second-half onslaught. In Cahill's three championship wins (over Clare, twice, and Offaly), they have netted 16 times. In the 10 games they haven't won, they have raised just seven green flags. A Tipperary supporter cheers on during their win over Clare. Natasha Barton / INPHO Natasha Barton / INPHO / INPHO The way in which Tipp ground out victory in Ennis was equally encouraging. The All-Ireland champions had wiped out a 12-point lead and introduced All-Stars in Shane O'Donnell, David Fitzgerald, and John Conlon. It was one-way traffic. Yet Tipp reversed the flow with four clutch points in succession. Tipp's green-flag balance sheet still needs some addressing. They conceded two goals per game in the 2023 championship. In 2024, it ticked up to 2.5 goals per game. So far in 2025, it's risen to 2.67 goals per game. Their main remedy in Ennis was fouling Banner runners. They racked up four yellow cards by half-time but escaped with just one more in the second half. Clare scored 1-14 from placed balls. It proved a sacrifice worth making, this time at least. In his rookie year, Robert Doyle has become their go-to man-marker. After holding David Reidy scoreless, the Clonoulty clubman was a surprise match for Alan Connolly on Leeside. The Corkman tapped in his customary goal but further damage was mitigated. In Ennis, he took on Tony Kelly and held him scoreless from play, despite an early booking and Kelly's second-half resurgence. Can this win be a turning point for Cahill's Tipperary? Evidence shows they haven't always adapted well to weeklong turnarounds. In 2023, they drew with Limerick in Thurles but seven days later, lost to a Waterford side with nothing to play for. Later that summer, after thrashing Offaly, they limped out of championship to Galway one week later. Related Reads Brian Hayes: 'You fear for the worst but thankfully it wasn't anything serious' The factors behind Clare's struggles in 2025 and their grounds for optimism now That improved somewhat in '24. After their hammerings to Limerick and Cork, Tipp did see a necessary bounce in drawing with Waterford and a creditable dead-rubber defeat to Clare. This year, their Limerick draw was followed by a heavy Cork defeat, marred by Darragh McCarthy's first-minute red card. Michael Breen of Tipperary celebrates after the game. Natasha Barton / INPHO Natasha Barton / INPHO / INPHO Waterford had Clare lined up for a fall after their seven-day turnaround. They intend to do just the same in Thurles. Those extra two days will be a valuable commodity for Cahill. Tipp will be boosted by the return of Toomevara teenager McCarthy. Alongside Doyle and Sam O'Farrell, he's part of a youthful reinvigoration which renders some of those past experiences to history. They won't mind that Tipp are aiming to put together back-to-back championship victories for the first time since their 2019 All-Ireland success. Equally, the Premier will take courage from recent performances. They have faced the two teams to climb the Hogan Stand steps since they did so. Neither have prevailed against them. That much is progress.
