GAA president Christy Cooney has offered his backing to the Association's referees.

High-profile referees came under scrutiny at the weekend when they made major errors at the end of both the O'Byrne Cup final between DCU and Louth and the Limerick / Longford game in Division Four, but Cooney points out that the men in the middle are only human and will obviously make mistakes.

Speaking at the launch of the U21 championships in Croke Park, he stated:

"The referees are well aware of the rules and it was human error over the weekend; we won't be specially bringing in the referees as a group.

"Mick Curley (chairman of the National Referees Committee) and his committee will talk to the referees on an ongoing basis, as they do, but it was human error at the weekend, nothing else.

"They are all well versed and well educated on the rules and exactly what's to happen.

"These things happen in a change of rules. We regret, naturally, that it happened and we would have preferred if it didn't happen." Tweet

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