Tyrone Secretary Dominic McCaughey has rounded on the Black Cards in his report to the county Convention.

The Red Hand official believes the rule relating to the black card has failed the GAA.

"The black card has been a failure for the Association in all respects; it has failed our players, our match officials, our disciplinary administrators and it has failed to diminish or eliminate cynical behaviour in football," says McCaughey.

"Players have suffered unnecessarily by both the application of the black card and by the misapplication of it; there is a clear and significant discrepancy in the severity of the penalty that applies to a player receiving a black card in added time at the end of a game compared with the player who receives it in the opening quarter of a match - this is unfair.

"Match officials are almost always placed in an impossible situation in making a determination as to whether the appropriate threshold of deliberateness has been reached in order to merit the imposition of a black card; often a judgement must be made at quite a distance from an incident that has taken place in a period of time, measured in seconds - it is unfair to ask the match officials to do so. There is also a major lack of consistency among referees in their perceptions of what infraction merits a black card.

"Regrettably, there is no evidence to indicate that the black card has been successful in eliminating the deliberate fouls associated with cynical behaviour at both Club and County levels; one example from the available evidence is quite contrary: that 37 black cards were issued to players in 21 intercounty games during a peak period of championship activity last summer (9th July - 1st August).

"Perhaps the black card can be set aside now for all deliberate cynical behaviour fouls, in the same way that it has never been applied for the so-called 'sledging' infraction, nor for the infraction of remonstrating in an aggressive manner with a match official. If it retains its place in the Official Guide then the application of the rule, and the misapplication of the rule, will continue to be the subject of discussion during and after games - rather than the game itself, or the quality of the performance, or the level of skills on display. The after-match focus by supporters, players, analysts and the media should always be on the game; it should not be on a rule."

Tweet

Most Read Stories