On Gaelic Games: A late friend of mine used to pinpoint certain watershed moments as that stage at which it is decided the tomfoolery has to stop.

Whereas it would take a brave observer to decide categorically that the GAA has reached such an epiphany, the weekend just gone ought to count as some sort of a milestone on the via dolorosa that is the association's disciplinary dealings.

At present there is a sub-committee pondering the future of the Games Administration Committee along the lines that its remit should be split into fixture making and administration of discipline.

It might be tempting to imagine that such reform will go a long way to addressing the heart of the matter but the problems are more widespread than the GAC and its vacillations both of composition and policy.

Why has regard for discipline become virtually an optional extra in the playing of the games? There are many contributory factors but they all pass through the one conduit, namely the strong likelihood that delinquency will not be punished.

That poisonous assurance is likely to be challenged by the blanket coverage of the weekend's controversies. What happened in Limerick on Saturday was plainly a disgrace. Maybe some of the reactions were excessive but a running battle between players and officials constitutes serious disorder.

Depending on how much the referee saw, there may be a need for video evidence and at the moment there are concerns that no complete record of the mayhem exists - or at least none that the GAC are likely to get their hands on.

Yet for all the anarchy and blood spilled the events at the Gaelic Grounds were less disturbing than the incident in which Henry Shefflin nearly lost an eye.

We can assume that the Clare player didn't intend to cause the nearly grievous injury but he is clearly guilty of striking. The physical proximity of Shefflin meant Gerry Quinn had to be aware of him and therefore was at least reckless as to what part of the anatomy he hit after propelling the hurl through the space between the players.

It was Quinn's misfortune - and more starkly Shefflin's - that this dig, which might on another day have gone unnoticed, nearly cost someone the sight of one eye. Obviously the fact it was one of the game's great players suffering a near-calamitous injury has influenced the reaction but the season has been full of unacceptable actions receiving inadequate censure.

What is of general concern is that the line between what is acceptable and what is out-and-out dangerous is now so blurred that it gets crossed on a weekly basis and generally with impunity.

The abiding irony of the past two weeks is that the only player to run foul of the rules on red cards has been Kilkenny's Tommy Walsh, acknowledged as both a phenomenal talent and purely a player of the ball, who picked up two yellows in the drawn Clare-Kilkenny match.

The problem starts with the rules. How enforceable are they? Why every week is it possible to pick out refereeing errors when reviewing videos of matches?

Referees nowadays work harder on their fitness and performance than ever before. But mistakes contribute to an environment of hostility towards match officials, who are regularly the first port of call when teams and their supporters look for scapegoats after defeat.

Referees, however, don't always help themselves in the areas under their unambiguous control. Failures of nerve in the punishment of offences on the field and in their official reports to the GAC have exacerbated the problems facing the committee.

One of the reasons behind this permissiveness is surely the rulebook and its precise menu of suspension prescriptions. When Kildare referee Michael Monahan balked at flashing a red card to John McEntee following his foul on Barry Monaghan in last year's All-Ireland semi-final, he was presumably mindful that the consequence of his action would be to rule the Armagh player out of the final.

During the tenure of the previous GAC a system was established under which deficient decisions such as the above would be revisited and an appropriate suspension imposed. By the end of that three-year term of office the message was beginning to sink in: there would be consequences for foul play.

The current GAC refuse to exercise this power, implicitly holding that once a referee has acted his decision must be upheld. This has created a further comfort zone for miscreants.

Any new disciplinary committee will have to address this and rule changes that dissociate the referee's action in sending off a player from the ultimate punishment, which should be a matter for the committee alone, should also be considered.

A sin bin could also be considered as a means of establishing order on the field without prejudice to what happens in the committee room.

Even when they do the right thing, GAC are vulnerable to being undermined on a couple of fronts. The right of appeal to Central Council can result in populist decisions being taken without a shred of procedural substantiation.

The committee also has to deal with an increasingly chaotic dispensation on the field. For instances the recent decision to allow water carriers enter the pitch at will is being abused (in Croke Park last Sunday, one carrier came on clutching two bottles of water, walked up to two players in succession, spoke to them and departed without a drop being offered or drunk).

Away from the GAA's councils there is the threat of litigation. Westmeath's Rory O'Connell was suspended for stamping on a player but managed to secure an interlocutory injunction that allowed him play in the county's Leinster final win.

Nothing the GAC did was found to be procedurally incorrect (the judge specifically said he was making no determination on the merits of the case) but the suspension was laid aside pending a full hearing, which won't take place until the suspension no longer has any impact.

Yet the GAA took no steps to stand over the GAC decision, either by rehearing the original case (as the judge said they would be allowed to do) or by appealing the interim award of the injunction - as the Dublin County Board did two years ago when Na Fianna were holding up the county championship.

Amidst the moral paralysis it's little wonder that it has taken a mini-riot and the near partial blinding of a top player to focus attention on the need for discipline. The tomfoolery has to stop.