Paul Flynn was feeling aggrieved after three huge refereeing decisions went against Dublin in their All-Ireland SFC semi-final defeat to Kerry.

David Clifford scored a controversial penalty at the second attempt after Peadar Ó Cofaigh-Byrne was penalised for a high challenge on Joe O’Connor in the first minute, while there was more than a suspicion of ‘square ball’ about the Kingdom’s second goal from the fist of Sean O’Brien in the second half.

And Dublin fans were fuming again when Ross McGarry’s 57th minute shot appeared to cross the line before it was scrambled away by Mike Breen.

Speaking on The Sunday Game, former Dublin star Flynn stated: “When you look back at it you see that the ball clearly crossed the line. Then the square ball was a square ball.”

When fellow pundit Tomás Ó Sé suggested that the McGarry incident was hard to call in real time, Flynn replied: “I think you're being very kind on the umpires. They have one job, to call when the ball goes over the line. This is a game of inches. Every play was about inches. All of the inches were taken by Kerry today by some of the officiating.

“That was a tough call on the goal at a crucial time. The square ball was as clear a square ball as you're going to see, we had a peno that was a harsh call early doors.

“We had a massive turnover on David Clifford, and turnovers on David Clifford are few and far between, they bent down to pick up the ball and get fouled and there's no free. I think there were very tough calls on Dublin today.”

Afterwards, Dublin manager Ger Brennan called for the introduction of video technology to assist match officials.

Tweet

Most Read Stories