Pat McEnaney has said that referees have missed a number of 'deliberate pull downs' in this year's Championship. The chairman of the referees committee admitted that some players have escaped black cards for obvious pulldowns.
In particular, he instanced Brian Fox's hauling down of James Kavanagh in the last 12 stage game between Tipperary and Galway(see here). Mystifyingly, Fox was not handed a black card by referee Barry Cassidy.
McEnaney told the Irish Examiner;
I think we as a group have to hold our hands up on the deliberate pull-down. There have been a number of deliberate pull-downs that we have missed in this year’s Championship, and we can get better at it.
McEnaney insisted that the black card overall and that referees had been excellent at spotting and punishing 'deliberate body-checks'.
When the asked about the decreasing frequency with which black cards have been doled out as the championship has gone in, he said this was down the greater levels of discipline exhibited by the top teams.
