Hawkeye

[Jinxy]

Hawkeye is the best solution here, sponsorship could cover most if not all the cost, a decision would be immediate and indisputable (afaik) so why not go for it?

Tell me how Hawkeye will work in a a football/hurling scenario and tell me how it is a better option than simply installing side-nets, which can easily be done in every pitch in the country.

Well for a start we installed the side nets on our brand new pitch and "they're a great job, blah blah blah". Yeah sure didn't the wind get up and pull the posts at least a further metre apart each! We soon got rid of them!

If Hawkeye is tried and tested in other sports then go for it I say. Even if we only have limited use of it sure at least we're trying to improve the situation. I can't see why Hawkeye couldn't be installed in every County Ground for Inter County football and Hurling games then at least every Championship game in Football and Hurling would be covered.

That's an engineering issue.
One that I'd imagine can be fixed pretty easily.
Much more easily than installing high-speed cameras for Hawkeye.
Zulu, the key point in what you said about Hawkeye was it will definitively tell us if the ball has gone 'between' the posts.
This would obviously necessitate increasing the height of the posts anyway as much of the borderline calls are above the existing post height.

[Bogball XV]

Hawkeye is the best solution here, sponsorship could cover most if not all the cost, a decision would be immediate and indisputable (afaik) so why not go for it?

Tell me how Hawkeye will work in a a football/hurling scenario and tell me how it is a better option than simply installing side-nets, which can easily be done in every pitch in the country.

Well for a start we installed the side nets on our brand new pitch and "they're a great job, blah blah blah". Yeah sure didn't the wind get up and pull the posts at least a further metre apart each! We soon got rid of them!

what happened exactly?  Were these posts from the lads linked to by Jinxy?  What height were they?  As Jinxy said though, it couldn't be that hard to fix?

[Zulu]

My understanding is that hawkeye will tell us if the ball was between the posts regardless of the height of the ball, therefore the posts are fine as they are.

[Jinxy]

This is from yestardays IT (Gavin Cummiskey).

'It is at this two-day gathering in Croke Park that the GAA research committee, chaired by Seán Donnelly from Kilmacud Crokes, will present their recommendations with regards to the introduction of Hawkeye and other recently-trialled measures.

Following a consistent flow of controversial decisions, which includes Joe Sheridan's goal for Meath in last year's Leinster football final and Graham Geraghty's disallowed effort for Meath against Kildare in June, the issue resurfaced in injury time at O'Moore Park on Saturday night.'

How would Hawkeye have prevented the Joe Sheridan incident?
Or the Graham Geraghty incident?
Or the Benny Coulter incident?
I see the GPA have thrown their full backing behind Hawkeye even if it may only be used in Croke Park due to the prohibitive cost.
What sort of a half-arsed solution is that?
Have people in this country completely lost the ability to think for themselves?

[Jinxy]

My understanding is that hawkeye will tell us if the ball was between the posts regardless of the height of the ball, therefore the posts are fine as they are.

So then it is extrapolating from the balls flight path with no visual point of reference such as an actual post or a tram line in tennis.
The system is not infallible you know Zulu, there is a margin of error.
I'd imagine that margin of error increases when you factor in wind which isn't a major issue in tennis and cricket.

[Bingo]

If in the qualifiers there are football and hurling matches on - maybe 10-12 at the height of the season and only a couple of these played in Croke Park, this means we would need at least 12 hawkeye kits to be in place at all these grounds. I'm sure this wouldn't come cheap? What about the NFL and NHL. Can be 20 games on at a weekend. 20 Hawkeye kits and operators. Some of the Div 4 gates would hardly cover the cost of installing and operating it.

Talk of sponsoring them??? I'm not sure someone will pay to put their name to it when the thing might be used once in a run of maybe 10/12 games. Where is their exposure and why would someone sponsor Hawkeye rather than something else.

[heffo]

This is from yestardays IT (Gavin Cummiskey).

'It is at this two-day gathering in Croke Park that the GAA research committee, chaired by Seán Donnelly from Kilmacud Crokes, will present their recommendations with regards to the introduction of Hawkeye and other recently-trialled measures.

Following a consistent flow of controversial decisions, which includes Joe Sheridan's goal for Meath in last year's Leinster football final and Graham Geraghty's disallowed effort for Meath against Kildare in June, the issue resurfaced in injury time at O'Moore Park on Saturday night.'

How would Hawkeye have prevented the Joe Sheridan incident?
Or the Graham Geraghty incident?
Or the Benny Coulter incident?

It wouldn't have prevented or make any 'call' on the above incidents.

[Zulu]

As heffo says it wouldn't help in any of those situations but that's irrelevant as nobody is saying it would help there.

I'm not 100% sure how hawkeye actually works but I haven't heard anyone suggest there is any significant issues with it, if there is I might revise my opinion.

I don't think it needs to be used during the national league, at least for the moment, as those games are not vital to a players season.

Like I said if the cost of using hawkeye is not prohibitive and there are no major issues with it's accuracy then why not give it a go?

[Jinxy]

Zulu, the games that Hawkeye is currently used in are as far removed from Gaelic games as you can get.
Cricket and tennis are perfect for this kind of technology.
I don't think it is suited to Gaelic games for the reasons I've previously stated.
I think there is a simpler, more effective option that eliminates the cost issue and it can be applied at all levels of the game.
As for your assertion that nobody is claiming Hawkeye would help with square ball incidents etc., pretty much every media report on the subject has included references to Joe Sheridan and/or Benny Coulter.
People are so fed up with the incompetence of the match officials that if you told them you were bringing in a system involving trained pigeons sitting on top of each post that will only coo if the ball goes over, they'd think it would be an improvement.

[Bogball XV]

Wind can be quite significant in tennis

Found this explanation from a poster on a tennis website:

The actual Hawkeye system uses a predictive algorithm to guess where the ball should be during the next measurement sample. If the ball deviates from this, it takes into account the deviation during the next prediction. From using a series of samples, it is possible to compensate for varying trajectories due to spin or wind. Gusty wind conditions may affect accuracy somewhat if the ball location changes are sudden and extreme, but I don't think that any condition that is playable would be outside the capabilities of the system, and if it were they would just have to increase the sampling rate and throw some more CPU cycles at it.

[Hardy]

People are so fed up with the incompetence of the match officials that if you told them you were bringing in a system involving trained pigeons sitting on top of each post that will only coo if the ball goes over, they'd think it would be an improvement.

There has to be a hamster-based solution.

[Zulu]

Jinxy it appears we'll have to agree to disagree here but the only reasonable objection that I can see is cost, if that isn't an issue then it should be used IMO.

As for media reports referencing Joe Sheridan etc. well that's just nonsense from media sources. Use hawkeye to sort disputed points and whether balls went over the line for goals. Change the square ball rule, the one used in last years league seems like a good one, and demand higher standards from refs. We can't get everything right but we can get something's right and that's an improvement worth making.

[Hound]

Hawkeye for Croke Park as it has the big screens to show replays (I know you don't strictly need the screens, but like in tennis and cricket it would be a way of getting someone to sponsor it).

The nets for other county grounds

Okay, that would give Croke Park a slightly better standard of officiating, but you could say the same about every game Pat McEnenany refs.

[Jinxy]

People are so fed up with the incompetence of the match officials that if you told them you were bringing in a system involving trained pigeons sitting on top of each post that will only coo if the ball goes over, they'd think it would be an improvement.

There has to be a hamster-based solution.

HamsterEye.

[thejuice]

I think every club should have the side nets at the very least.

Give both a trial run in the league so whichever suits the games, the practicality and cost go with it.