Ciarán Murphy: Kilcoo’s outrageous behaviour demeans the club’s standing in the GAA

Kilcoo won their 11th Down county title in 12 years last Sunday, in a final that showcased the evolution in their style under new manager Karl Lacey. I don’t think I’ve ever seen them play with such attacking intent and enterprise.

When you consider the close calls Glen and Kilmacud Crokes experienced in their own championships the last two weekends, Kilcoo are now many people’s pick to be our next All-Ireland champions.

But, despite their win, it’s been a black few days for them. At the start of last week, Kilcoo objected to the appointment of Paul Faloon, a member of the intercounty referees panel and so by consensus Down’s best referee, to take charge of their county final against Burren.

Kilcoo didn’t fancy it. They objected to the board over the appointment (according to Down GAA’s own statement on the matter) “on the grounds of perceived bias. We regarded this as entirely baseless and were determined to fight for the integrity of the referee and the appointment”.

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And the Down County Board was indeed happy to fight for the integrity of the referee and the appointment at the Disputes Resolution Authority on Saturday morning … but not thereafter, even when the DRA rightly laughed Kilcoo out the door.

A club taking the appointment of a referee all the way to the DRA is worthy only of contempt – but then why didn’t Paul Faloon referee the game?

We can only speculate. Down’s statement said first that “not even the notion of postponement would deter us from the clear opinion that everyone should respect his appointment.

“However, in the course of Saturday late morning and afternoon, matters transpired that became increasingly difficult for us to resolve. We were left with the prospect that there may be no referee for the fixture and, as a result, had no option but to appoint an alternative official to referee the game.”

This is extraordinary. What ‘matters transpired’? Was it Faloon’s decision not to ref the game – and if it was, was it because he felt he had less than unqualified support from the county board?

The impeccably-sourced northern journalist Declan Bogue reported on the42.ie yesterday that Faloon had asked for a public statement from Down GAA outlining how unwarranted the DRA appeal was; stewards from outside the county to be appointed at the ground; and for him to be fitted with a microphone during the game. Regardless of the rights, wrongs and logistical hurdles those requests represent, they all suggest a sense of unease on Faloon’s part.

When an impasse was reached with Faloon, Down GAA asked David Gough, who perhaps unthinkingly accepted the job on Saturday evening. Then, having realised what a farrago he’d walked into, Gough wisely withdrew his services, surely in solidarity with his colleague on the intercounty referees panel.

Why Brian Higgins, the Down official who eventually reffed the game, thought it was a good idea to step into the breach is something he’d have to answer.

The lack of leadership from the Down County Board is pathetic. I saw it suggested in the Irish News this week that any win for Burren with Paul Faloon in charge of the game would have been seen as diminished or compromised in some way. Nothing could be further from the truth.

If the game had started with Faloon present, and the Kilcoo team absent, there would have been absolutely no question over the legitimacy of Burren’s win – if a team doesn’t want to show up for a county final over some juvenile, pathetic, imagined vendetta a respected referee has for their club, then that’s on them and them alone.

I couldn’t imagine anyone anywhere thinking the Down County Board had behaved improperly if Kilcoo had forfeited the game over this. For a club to attempt to strong-arm a county board into changing a refereeing appointment is a disgrace. For a county board to allow it to happen is just as shameful.

The same county board, of course, appointed a Kilcoo player as their manager last year. The Down team is dominated by Kilcoo players. This should not have had any impact on how the county board handled this. Did it?

Kilcoo is exactly the sort of feel-good story that’s supposed to make the club championship. They’re a small community, backboned by a couple of massively talented families, making the most of a golden generation.

Under Mickey Moran their football was effective, if fairly tiresome to watch. That they had a coach and a manager travelling three and four times a week from Derry also didn’t sit particularly well with people who might otherwise have bought into the Knocknagow for-the-sake-of-the-little-village aura.

And then there was Eugene Brannigan’s breathlessly naive and arrogant interview after he was named the All-Ireland club player of the year in April 2022. When asked about the Down seniors, a team he had at that time not played one minute of football for, he said:

“I think there’s a core of players who don’t know how to win. They haven’t the winning mentality. I think that’s why a lot of Kilcoo boys don’t want to be involved – they’re just there but I don’t think they’re there to win. That’s the difference between Kilcoo and the county.”

The idea that a man who’d never even tried his hand at playing at the top level of the game would see fit to lecture those with the courage to test themselves beyond club football was staggeringly self-absorbed.

Elsewhere that day, he was asked whether this unsparing attitude towards intercounty football ensured Kilcoo were disliked elsewhere in Down.

“Oh, yeah, I think that really fuels our fire. Everyone seems to be on our backs and that’s really what keeps us going, that’s what we love. We feel everyone is against us, county boards, the whole lot, but that’s what we want.”

This is the real travesty. They may think a siege mentality helps them. They’ll convince themselves they need controversies like this.

But Kilcoo’s behaviour this week has been outrageous and winning is no answer to that charge. Victory is not an end that would ever justify these means.