All-Ireland Senior Football final - Kerry v Dublin 18/09/2011

[The Hill is Blue]

Great news about Connolly. It is obvious that he was deliberately ambushed and that seems to have been recognised.  It would have been a scandal if such cheating had paid off.

[magpie seanie]

No offence to the Dubs but its a complete scandal that this red card has been overturned. I'd seriously question the legality of this decision.

[Bingo]

Maybe they decided if he wrote a letter to the Donegal player that he'd be ok.

I do wonder about the consistency of GAA rules and how they seem to apply them at top level and bend them when it suits.

Has any official explanation been given by the CHC why the overtuned a CCCC ruling?

[Rossfan]

No offence to the Dubs but its a complete scandal that this red card has been overturned. I'd seriously question the legality of this decision.

Agree 100% Seanie.
Can't overturn a blatently illegal goal in the Leinster final 2010 but a big county player can get out of anything.

[nrico2006]

Disgrace that he got off, but sure it is common practice now for the powers that be to make constant incorrect rulings.  The Donegal player should be embarrassed but Connolly was still correctly sent off and should have served the suspension.  As for technicalities, when did the amateur GAA organization become a Supreme Court of Law FFS.  Doesn't matter if he took his name before/after the card or told him to get off the f**king pitch, he committed the crime and should do the time.

[nrico2006]

No offence to the Dubs but its a complete scandal that this red card has been overturned. I'd seriously question the legality of this decision.

Agree 100% Seanie.
Can't overturn a blatently illegal goal in the Leinster final 2010 but a big county player can get out of anything.

Good point.  It is frustrating that there are big games decided by incorrect calls that are not allowed to be addressed after a game (replay etc) yet they can punish/let-off players based on the same video evidence. 

[Hill16 Blues]

That's a load of nonsense. The only reason he got sent off was that Boyle fell to the ground holding his face. Connolly was hit in exactly the same way by Kavanagh and stayed up. Neither was a red card offense unless you want ridiculous situation of 5/6 players being sent off in every game.

The rules are the rules but the referee must use common sense and proper judgement in making a major decision to send off a player in any game but particularly in All Ireland semi final. The reason for the red card being rescinded isn't clear but whatever the reason justice has most definitely been done.

Marty Boyle though is still a disgrace to his team/county!

[heffo]

Has any official explanation been given by the CHC why the overtuned a CCCC ruling?

I'll post the details later.

[Fear ón Srath Bán]

Apparently he was (technically) acting in self-defence, not offensively (unless the journos still have it wrong!  ).

[Canalman]

Wasting your time imo debating the issue with posters who hate the Dubs with a passion and are convinced that there is a GAA plot to hand us the AI.

There are none so blind as those who will not see.

Almost sure the Whelan/Crawford incident is going to get an airing shortly (followed anon by the "David Brady put mannners on him" posts) and that is even before the Kerry caterwailing/ Peigsayering  begins.

Jeez, Pantomime villians get a better reception from an audience of kids.

[magpie seanie]

Wasting your time imo debating the issue with posters who hate the Dubs with a passion and are convinced that there is a GAA plot to hand us the AI.

There are none so blind as those who will not see.

Almost sure the Whelan/Crawford incident is going to get an airing shortly (followed anon by the "David Brady put mannners on him" posts) and that is even before the Kerry caterwailing/ Peigsayering  begins.

Jeez, Pantomime villians get a better reaction from an audience of kids.

Cop yourself on. This is nothing to do with who he plays for or not. Forget the whataboutery and concentrate on what actually happened. There is no way video could exhonerate Connolly under the rules. The CHC made a balls of this pure and simple. I suspect you know this and are trying to have a row about something else to muddy the waters....

[OverThePostsAWide]

Can't overturn a blatently illegal goal in the Leinster final 2010 but a big county player can get out of anything.

A nonsensical (hysterical) comparison Rossfan. The first would attempt to re-referee the match again (but why stop at the last minute goal? what about the free, 5 minutes before, or the foul that wasn't seen before that? etc, etc), and the second addresses the post match fallout (suspension) for a potentially wrong decision.

[OverThePostsAWide]

Apparently he was (technically) acting in self-defence, not offensively (unless the journos still have it wrong!  ).

IIRC Marsden's suspension for his sending off in 2003 was overturned? Was that on a self-defence basis?

[Canalman]

Ok, will do. In a tense spiteful and compressed game, one player exaggerated a contact which resulted in another player getting sent off. Same incident saw 2 others replicating the contact and none got sent off.

A nobrainer imo.

Will beg to disagree with many others here with a Pollyannaesque view of how the game should be played.

[Hardy]

It shows how difficult an administrator's job can be, never mind a referee's, when you have sensible, sincere people here taking dramatically opposing views of an incident we all saw clearly. It illustrates that it all comes down to interpretation.

In this case, the rule is fairly clear cut - the offence is "to strike or to attempt to strike an opponent with head, arm, elbow, hand or knee". It doesn't say anything about self defence. Neither does it say anything about what part of the opponent's body is struck. So it would seem there's not much room for interpretation.

But was it a strike? What defines a strike? This is where interpretation comes in. For me, Connolly is fending off an aggressor. He puts up his two outstretched arms with his fists closed. That's my interpretation. Others will say it was more than "putting up" his arms/fists. It was a punch.

Who's right? I don't know. I imagine the answer depends on when a push/fend off becomes a punch and I imagine that depends on the speed of movement of the hands. But there's no definition of this in the rules (or anywhere else, that I know of), so we're back to interpretation.

All I can offer is my own interpretation that it’s an extreme interpretation to call either of Connolly’s contacts with Boyle a strike. If we consider intent, anyone intending to strike with malice doesn’t push out with his two fists straight in front of him, like a girl.

If Connolly had done exactly the same thing, but caught Boyle in the chest with both contacts, would people be calling it a red card offence? Yet the rule says nothing about a strike in the face being worse than one in the chest.

And since it’s a matter of interpretation, if I was the one charged with the decision, I would err in my interpretation on the side of natural justice and attach considerable weight to Boyle’s antics and the fact that Kavanagh did exactly the same to Connolly without penalty. 

Consistency of interpretation is another question altogether and that’s where you have to wonder when you compare Brian Farrell’s red card that stuck, Whelan’s punch on Crawford and the Connolly incident.