GAA disciplinary procedures can be a complicated beast and both JJ Delaney and Lar Corbett will be very thankful of that state of affairs right now.
If an outsider was to ask if GAA disciplinary measures are far from straightforward they would be met with a response along the lines of ‘Does a bear sh*t in the woods?’
Whether it’s taking a case to the CCCC, the DRA or stopping short of giving it an NCT, there have been numerous examples of counties exploiting loopholes in the association rulebook in recent years in an effort to get their players off the hook.
The latest to benefit from said loopholes are the high-profile pair Lar Corbett and JJ Delaney, who were both given red cards in Kilkenny’s feisty league final victory over Tipperary last weekend.
According to a report by Jackie Cahill in today’s Irish Examiner, although Corbett and Delaney have both been hit four-week suspensions, they should also have been automatically suspended for their next competitive inter-county outing in accordance with a rule introduced last year.
It turns out that, thanks to a similar case involving Barry Gilleran of the Longford Gaelic Football team, that they will be cleared to play in championship openers for Tipperary and Kilkenny after all.
Gilleran was sent off in Longford’s final NFL game of the season but will be clear to play in the first round of the Leinster Championship after Congress did not have the power to extend the rule initiated in 2012 into 2013 as the National League was already underway by the time they had made that decision.
More details on the technicalities can be found in Cahill’s report in the Irish Examiner but the bottom line is that Gilleran, Corbett and Delaney will all be free to play in the championship, meaning that they will have served no punishment, in an inter-county setting at least, for their crimes.
The counties involved are not the first and won’t be the last to exploit the loopholes and technicalities that are seemingly awash in the association and it’s not the players’ fault, but just another example of GAA justice gone mad.
