Charged with keeping track of referees

Just two weeks into the championship the issue of referees and match officiating is already a talking point. Last Sunday's matches produced two contentious moments, with Monaghan footballer Rory Woods awarded a point when it looked wide, and vice versa for Limerick hurler Mark Keane.

Certain team managers, including Armagh's Joe Kernan, also called for further consultation with the match referees. These are just some of the concerns for the GAA's national match official co-ordinator David O'Donovan, who took up the new position last month.

O'Donovan - a former referee - also acts as secretary of Nickey Brennan's new national referees committee. They've only had one meeting since taking up office following Brennan's appointment, but O'Donovan has already been busy getting to grips with the job.

"We are always looking to improve the standards of referees and umpires around the country," said O'Donovan. "We've only had our first meeting, but the plan is to have new guidelines in place by the end of the championship.

"We also have a meeting next week for the referee assessors, a sort of refresher course to ensure they are up to date on what they need to be doing. And we already have around 11 seminars planned up to August 2007."

The two contentious incidents seen on Sunday are nothing new to championship action, yet resulted in the usual talk of improved scoring detection systems, such as electronic beams or nets behind the crossbar and uprights.

O'Donovan suggested those ideas could yet be some way off installation. "It is something I'd be aware of, and I will be making my own recommendations. But you will never completely cut out human error. All we can try to do is minimise it."

Claims that managers weren't being properly consulted with referees surprised O'Donovan as such a meeting was staged last Monday week. "Invitations were extended to all county boards," claimed O'Donovan, "following on from a meeting in January. Around 25 intercounty managers attended.

"One of the main things that came out of that was that managers felt they needed a proper channel or procedure to voice their opinions. Right now that doesn't really exist, and it's something we are looking into.

"Right now we have our referees' spokesman, Fr Séamus Gardiner, where referees can express feelings they might have on any of their decisions to him, and he then speaks on their behalf. Of course managers are still perfectly entitled to give their opinion but we'd like to have the proper channel for that."

Another of O'Donovan's responsibilities is to oversee the testing of national referees, which currently number around 200 across three grades, which was one of his first tasks when taking up his new appointment.

"Overall I have to say the level of fitness was very high. The test involves a 3,000-metre run, and all referees have to complete that in under 15 minutes, 30 seconds. The majority do it between 12 and 13 minutes."

There is also a written test which requires a 96 per cent correction rate: "There is still a small failure rate, but they do get a second chance. But one of thing we're looking at for next year is to remove that second chance."