GAA rules committee to clarify proposals to counter cynical play

Proposals to counter cynical play in football and hurling have gone back to the GAA’s Standing Committee on the Playing Rules (SCPR) for clarification. At the heart of the issue is what exactly constitutes “clear goalscoring opportunities”.

The SCPR recommend the introduction of a sin bin in hurling, an equivalent measure to football’s black card, the extension of which to hurling was emphatically rejected by last year’s annual congress. In both games, it is proposed that a penalty be awarded for the foul prevention of a goalscoring opportunity.

Pat Daly, the GAA’s director of organisational culture, planning, and development, is a member of the committee and says that they are happy to expand on the proposal, which will be considered by a Management Committee meeting this week in order to decide whether it will feature on the agenda of this year’s annual congress, which will be held remotely at the end of the month.

“That’s where it is,” he says. “We’re trying to get some clarification or elaboration around that. It was an attempt to find an equivalent for the professional foul in soccer and the penalty try in rugby without trying to go into all of the potential permutations on that. Theirs is a sense that the idea is a bit subjective and it needs to be more objective for consideration.

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“Goalscoring opportunity doesn’t necessarily lie exclusively with the guy who is in possession. It’s not as straightforward as people might think. For instance a player running towards goal is rugby tackled and there’s a guy inside unmarked.

“In soccer you have the offside line and the last man back and the goalkeeper. In rugby you don’t have any of that but a simple decision on whether a try would have been score but for foul play. It’s more complicated for us because there are more moving parts in terms of the presence of attackers and defenders as well as unlimited movement off the ball.”

New ground

One problem for the SCPR proposal may be that whereas of its two parts, the sin bin is easily understood as a sanction, as it is used in football to punish black-card infractions, the idea of awarding a penalty for the specific foul is breaking new ground.

There has been a groundswell of support for the idea that cynical fouling needs to be curbed in hurling – to the point that it is remarkable the idea of importing the black card into hurling attracted just 18 per cent 12 months ago.

Administrators raised the matter in annual reports. Dublin CEO John Costello had this to say in December.

“We have seen what you might term flagrant ‘black card’ offences in hurling on numerous occasions, and several times in this year’s championship too.

“The rugby-tackle pull-down that coughs up a free – and a relatively worthless yellow card – is the most recurring and frustrating one, especially when one team is defending a lead and hellbent on avoiding the concession of a goal. Would you see less of this particular type of foul if the punishment was ten minutes in the bin? We suspect so.”

Other well-known figures in hurling, such as Kilkenny’s Ned Quinn, outgoing chair of the Central Competitions Control Committee, and All-Ireland winning Wexford manager Liam Griffin backed the idea.

It was also well received at a Central Council meeting but the award of a penalty caused a certain amount of apprehension when floated at a meeting of county chairs last week and especially as the concept of a “clear goalscoring opportunity” was considered vague.

Another aspect of the reform that has caused concern is that whereas it would be introduced on an experimental basis the trials would take place in the championship. Precedent has been that such testing is scheduled for league fixtures.

If there isn’t a very broad consensus on the matter it will probably not go ahead at the upcoming congress, as conspicuously debatable issues are expected to be held back until the GAA can meet in person.

But for Daly, the time is now and he is confident the proposal can be satisfactorily worded.

“For the past six weeks the idea has been discussed at a variety of forums and we’ve heard a range of views. It’s not that we’re trying to come up with a perfect solution – we’d settle for something workable to address a problem that has become increasingly part of the game. As long as it pays to foul, nothing will change.

“Facts are facts and what happened in the hurling championship was there for all to see. You can go so far with words but there’s the video. That’s what we’re talking about.

“I think we can bring a greater level of objectivity to saying that if ‘x’ happens, it is followed by ‘y’ and try to take any ambiguity out of it. That’s the challenge. I’m happy enough that a formula can be found.”