Graham Geraghty will play no part in today's International Rules first Test. His absence is for disciplinary reasons arising from the racial abuse of a young Australian player who had marked Meath's All-Ireland winning captain during last Tuesday's practice match against the AFL Academy team at the MCG.

The action was taken against the Irish player after a long day of meetings and consultations in Melbourne. Although early indications were that no disciplinary action would be taken by team management, the management committee of the GAA met in emergency session and decided to request that the player not be selected.

The firm statement by the GAA and the imposition of a sanction, together with the player's expression of remorse, will go some way to defusing the potential damage to the association's image but overall the affair has been a great embarrassment to the International Rules tour.

On Tuesday night, in response to a question about Geraghty's apparent apology to the player Damien Cupido, Ireland manager Colm O'Rourke dismissed the matter as an altercation over a tackle. It was only when a story appeared in the Melbourne Age that the truth emerged.

It turned out that Geraghty had indeed been involved in an altercation but the post-match apology had been caused by his reference to Cupido as a "black c***".

There was an immediate intervention by a match official who pointed out that such abuse amounted to "racial vilification". An Australian team official was made aware of the incident and he reported it to Irish counterpart Albert Fallon at half-time.

By the end of the match, Jim Stynes, who is Australia's assistant manager, had raised the issue with O'Rourke and suggested that Geraghty apologise. "Jim Stynes told us that we should apologise to him," says O'Rourke, "that it was in the best interests of everybody to do so. So we did when informed of it."

Stynes has a background in opposing racism in sport but when asked about the matter afterwards, declined to mention that this issue was at the heart of the Geraghty exchange. Meanwhile Barney Winston, chairman of the International Dimensions Workgroup, who is a friend of the Cupido family, told the GAA that no insult had been taken.

Damien Cupido is a talented under-age footballer whose parents emigrated from South Africa. He is a member of the Australian Institute of Sport/NFL Academy and played against the Ireland under-17s last April. He is expected to be drafted by a major club in the future.

His father Garth, a teacher, told The Age that his son had not taken offence and that he had accepted the apologies of both Geraghty and Irish officials.

O'Rourke convened a press conference yesterday morning to address both the report and the fact that he had misled the media on Tuesday. "My interest was in protecting Graham Geraghty at the time," he said.

In the course of detailed questioning, it emerged that O'Rourke's main concerns were to set the record right with the press whom he had misled and to prevent Geraghty's "name being dragged through the mud in Ireland."

O'Rourke accepted that the remark had been particularly insensitive. But he was also at pains to point out that Geraghty had become very upset over the controversy and defended the player's absence from the press conference.

"Graham Geraghty has had a couple of sleepless nights over this, that's how seriously it has affected him and getting him to a press conference like that, I don't feel would be helpful to him or probably you either."

Asked whether any disciplinary action would be taken, O'Rourke replied: "No, there won't be any disciplinary action. He has been spoken to about it privately."

There the matter stood until it emerged that an emergency meeting of the GAA's management committee had been convened - it is believed on the initiative of GAA president Joe McDonagh. By now, most of the media present had been shocked by the Ireland management's failure to grasp the importance of the issue.

That a senior Irish player should have racially abused a teenager in a harmless challenge match was bad enough but now the situation was being exacerbated by the reluctance to take any disciplinary measures against Geraghty.

The consistent argument from O'Rourke and most of the Irish camp was that the matter had been resolved to the satisfaction of the young player and the NFL and that accordingly it should be left alone.

"The seriousness of it," said O'Rourke of the situation, "was that it got four or five lines in the paper here. One paper. And what did it say? The parents of the person involved, they don't think it's serious. You know, is that good enough for you?"

Yet McDonagh was conscious that the public in Ireland would be more of a factor than the public in Australia for whom Cupido is still an under-age player. Geraghty had captained Meath to the All-Ireland less than a fortnight previously. The impact of his involvement in a case of this nature was always going to be substantial.

Consequently the decision was taken to order the withdrawal of Geraghty from today's test and reiterate the GAA's opposition to "any racist remarks by players or officials."