A decade after its introduction by the GAA, Oisin McConville believes Gaelic football's black card has become "outdated" and that "it needs to change".
McConville feels that players are being coached to commit the type of cynical fouls which are not deemed to fit within the black card rules.
"The black card rule has already been coached around," McConville, the current Wicklow football manager, told the GAA Social podcast.
"We need to go more towards a professional foul. I saw it happen in our own [Wicklow] game [on Sunday]. I'm told 'That's the law, that's the rule. Read the rulebook'. If that is the rule, then the rule needs to change.
27 January 2024; Ciaran McFaul of Derry, left, is shown a black card by referee Joe McQuillan during the Allianz Football League Division 1 match between Kerry and Derry at Austin Stack Park in Tralee, Kerry. Photo by Brendan Moran/Sportsfile
"The reason why it needs to change is if someone is going through and you don't pull somebody to the ground but you deliberately stop them from going through with a foul [you don't get a black card].
"If we are going to continue with this black card, that's what we need to do; we need to introduce that extra little sentence into the rule, if it looks as cynical as some of them are. You're told, 'But he didn't drag him to the ground' but [it should] still be a black card as well.
The Armagh man says teams "are rewarded for that bit of cynicism".
"If you don't do it, you get absolutely destroyed at the team meeting. Your fellow players, coaches - they will destroy you for it," the 2002 All-Ireland winner continued.
28 January 2024; Referee Seán Hurson shows a black card to Ryan O'Donoghue of Mayo, 15, during the Allianz Football League Division 1 match between Galway and Mayo at Pearse Stadium in Galway. Photo by Piaras Ó Mídheach/Sportsfile
"Therefore, the rule must change, the rule must be adapted to bring in the consideration that it is now being coached around. This rule at a certain time really fitted the bill of where Gaelic football was, but it doesn't fit it anymore.
"I still don't think the black card is ideal but I do think there still is a deterrent with the black card. The wording of the actual rule doesn't give the referee the opportunity to punish situations like that.
"Unless we change things in order to make that happen, then that same thing that frustrates the life out of you is just going to keep on happening."
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