Now far be it from me to criticise referees. However I was at a div 4 game today when a home player was clearly punched by the away number 7. The referee was coming to the incident from BEHIND the number seven so there was no way he didn't see what happened, there was nobody blocking his view and he had to clearly see two things, that the player punched somebody and the players number. Incredibly he then went in and spoke to both umpires before booking both the seven and the player he struck. If ever I saw a referee bottling a sending off this was it. The remark was passed beside me "Is it any wonder the Derrytresk thing happened when refs won't issue obvious red cards", and that remark came from a group of supporters of the team who's player threw the punch. Fortunately the player who was struck didn't seem too badly hurt, but that's hardly the point, referees like this will allow situations to develop that will lead to a player being seriously hurt. And this ref got an adult championship final last season I believe. Overall he was well in control of the match, which was easy enough to handle, but he just completely messed up the one big call he had to make and that is just wrong.
To be fair I didn't actually see that part of it, if he did what you said then yes he had to go as well. But that wasn't my point, I wasn't even blaming the player for throwing the punch, what I was getting at was the fact that the referee clearly seen what happened but didn't act on what he saw. I assume what you are telling me is accurate which makes it even worse, that between two umpires and the ref they now seemingly missed TWO red card offences in an incident that happened less than 20 metres from the goal. My initioal point stands though the ref bottled out of his only major call.
Your right atfer speaking to his umpires he somehow managed to book both players. Soon after at the other end another umpire called him in and again he booked a Slane player when he should has issused a straight red. Why would an umpire (they seemed to be all with the ref) call a ref in if he did not see something which was a sending off offence.
Typical 1st round of the League lads a bit rusty and sure if I sent them off he would miss a bunch of games with the way Division is set up this.
I was at the game and what about the away player who got a kick in the head or the away player who also got a punch in the second half, I know the punch you are talking about and it should of been a red but why didn't you mention the other ones