One member of the Disputes Resolution Authority disagreed strongly with the body's decision to rescind Diarmuid Connolly's red card.

The Dublin attacker was granted an eleventh-hour reprieve following a seven-hour tribunal and cleared to play in the All-Ireland semi-final replay against Mayo, having been red-carded following an injury-time altercation with Lee Keegan in the drawn game.

It has emerged that the three-man independent body was split on the matter of Connolly's appeal and that the DRA's decision to vindicate the player was not unanimous. While Hugh O'Flaherty and David Nohilly found that the Dublin forward had not been afforded fair procedures by the CCCC, Meath-based solicitor Brian Rennick vehemently disagreed.

The publication of the DRA's decision has highlighted the extent to which one of its members felt that there were no grounds to overturn the red card:

"It is my view that the claimant [Connolly] in this instance was afforded fair procedures, there being no misapplication of any of the rules complained of and there being no breach of accepted principles of fair procedures, natural and constitutional justice, such as would entitle this Tribunal to interfere with any of the decisions made.

"I strenuously disagree therefore with the majority decision which finds that there was 'a significant impairment of the rights of the claimant, which was disproportionate, irrational and unfair'.

"I am further of the view that the decision and reasons of the majority in this case is fundamentally wrong in that it is, in fact, based on reasoning the arguments which were not canvassed by the claimant at all and, as such, are in fact the construct of the majority in circumstances where in fact the Tribunal did not find in favour of the claimant in respect of 10 of the 11 Grounds of claim as submitted.

"The single Ground of Claim on which the majority have found in favour of the Claimant is firstly a ground that should not have been considered by the Tribunal as it had not in fact been advanced before the CHC."

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