Abuse of Referees

Hope I'm not accused of taking this off topic but to explain how I see it the amount of rucks in a game take the pace out of it, I'd agree you need to be much closer to make the call than in GAA. Just in terms of reffing a game well would experience of playing a lot help a referee in rugby?

Abusing a referee is a mindset. Some are just set in their ways and see it as normal. But yes some of the rules certainly don't help at all. The square ball rule should be brought in line with football. The black card is desperately needed in hurling now. Get rid of the handpass and let lads throw it in an underhanded manner. That's whats happening most of the time anyway so remove the ambiguity.

Possibly introduce something around puck outs to remove the turgid hand passing tactics. Maybe a puck out should have to travel beyond the 45 at least.

The biggest problem is that lads reffing can't keep up with the game. It's nothing to do with fitness most of the times. It's just the ball moving so fast and far in a short space of time. A couple of seconds usually. At inter-county level you'll have 2 Linesmen, a 4th official and 4 umpires to help the ref. That just isn't the case at club level where most of the abuse seems to occur. Too much is expected of referees in hurling particularly at club level.

A mindset and culture needs to be bred into youngsters playing the game that will eventually feed into the senior ranks whereby they don't question the ref at all. Although the issues mostly occur with sideline mentors and supporters. A scenario that if a clearly identifiable mentor abuses of aggressively questions a refs decions the referee can treat it like the same way he would if a player done it. Move the ball forward 13 meters.

The refs are dead right and more actions like this will be happening in the coming years I'm betting. Refs are completely disrespected by the association even though we are completely dependent on them. It's about time they realized what power they have collectively and stop asking for respect and start commanding it. If you thought you might be responsible for every match in the county getting cancelled, and the whole county knows who it is wrote the letter, you wouldn't be long winding your neck in.

Refs in kilkenny are 'on strike' for this weekend - Fri -> Monday.

They were originally just going to pull their services where the club involved were in action, but have , quite rightly , escalated it.

Gardai with that one. That's sick. Disgusting.

It's amazing that we have a crisis with the shortage of refs and people are still behaving this way.

I actually think that every ref in the country needs to take a stance. Not just again old fashioned abuse. But it's the constant challenging on decisions and dissent during a game. As an Organisation I think if we make it mandatory that nobody but the captain can speak to the ref regarding a decision during the game we would be in a better place. It all stems from the little things like dissent following the award of a free or a decision which goes against a team. It comes from the mentors on the line more so too.

Referees should be fully backed and empowered to walk out of a venue at the first instance of aggressive dissent or abuse.

It would be long before clubs would tackle it if games weren't played or abandoned.

The problem with refs walking out is that games will be called off, and some people might use this to their advantage.

A better solution is to have mandatory club representatives at each game who are responsible for supervising the actions of the crowd and intervening where necessary, removing individuals and making them face the clubs board over a breach of conduct, if a ref is being abused it is the one who giving the abuse who should be punished, not everyone else

Yea, people need to be quicker to tell the gobshites to shut up

Will you cop on to yourself, everyone I know in KK gaa community are disgusted by this fools actions so stop talking as if this disgraceful behaviour is being condoned in the county and grow up.

You said "You can see the level of ignorance the refs are dealing with is a collective thing over on the Kilkenny thread. Incapable of even discussing it. That's the kind of attitude that the refs are facing". That's quite clearly implying that kk people condone that letter. You're normally a better poster than this so I'll give you the benefit of the doubt here but your post seemed pretty clear to me.

You're the spoofer. When you were found out on the Kilkenny thread you resorted to posting misinformation on this thread. You seem to think you have superior authority on GAA matters, frequently dismissing others opinions.

Any reasonable person would be happy with how the Kilkenny County Board are handling the abuse of refs. The Gardai are investigating the matter, what more can be done for now.

I wonder how much of this is down to Alcohol, gambling, ignorance of the rules or a combination of all 3

Their refs are literally on strike, I am no expert but that doesn't sound like a happy bunch of campers to me.

Saying that reasonable people are happy with how the county board are handling the abuse seems to be out of touch with reality.