Murphy pessimistic about Aussie attitude

International Rules: One of the GAA's most experienced International Rules officials believes that the series should see out its agreed term of one more year. Nonetheless, Dr Con Murphy, Ireland team doctor for four years and a former chair of Croke Park's Medical and Anti-Doping sub-committee, is pessimistic about the Australian attitude to the game.

"I've always supported the game," he said. "It's a great concept and a shame that it's come to this. It's played into the hands of those who don't want this to go ahead. I've spoken to a lot of people, but I'm meeting very few who feel it should go ahead."

Murphy was present with the team in Melbourne last year when there was also public outcry over on-field violence, and he believes Ireland cannot compete in nakedly physical confrontations and therefore are not going to be the instigators.

"Last year we got desperate stick for not upping the physical stakes, but our players are not equipped to do that. There is no earthly way that Irish players go out to get stuck in. One thing that I can't understand is that, where the physical stakes have been dangerous, they have beaten us off the field. In other words, there has been no need to do it.

"I couldn't understand why Steven McDonnell, an exemplary sportsman, had this guy who kept hanging onto his jersey even when the match was well beyond doubt."

From a medical perspective he's not convinced Irish players are incapable of competing with the AFL team, purely because of the amateur/professional dichotomy, but he sees strict limits to the sustainability of that engagement.

"I was involved for four years, including the bad match in Melbourne last year, but over that time we had no serious injuries apart from Declan Browne in 2003, who was taken out in a practice match. But talk of a third Test (as advocated by AFL CEO Andrew Demetriou) - that's a step beyond us. There's no way Irish players would have been fit to play again next weekend."

Yet the last three years have seen evidence of heightened Australian physical confrontation, and with it, over the past two series, worrying indications that Ireland are losing ground in their ability to compete.

"There are two concerns: violence and our inability to match them on the field. We were castigated last year for not playing well and the big defeat was seen as a one-off, but this year the same has happened.

"They're no longer taking the best Australian Rules footballers but those that are best suited to playing the international game. They'd shake the All-Ireland if they came over in the summer to play ball."

The problem with maintaining contact next year is that the assurances received and the measures agreed between the GAA and the AFL over the past 12 months did nothing to improve the disciplinary situation, and despite the delicacy of the problem Murphy acknowledges there was no account taken of that in the player behaviour.

"I think we should run with it once more, but there is an issue of trust. The Australian attitude is different to ours - it's 'win at all costs'. Even our championship matches don't have that; you'd never see Cork and Kerry spilling over in the first minute or Tyrone and Armagh - of course they have their incidents but you wouldn't see the scenes we saw at the weekend.

"The Graham Geraghty tackle might have been legitimate but it was finished off in a mean-spirited way. He was thrown to the ground and pressed down on with an elbow. Don't tell me it was fair. It was the equivalent of what happened Brian O'Driscoll on the Lions tour.

"The Australians, I feel, have disrespected the whole concept of the game by not abiding by the rules. Jim Stynes (Australia assistant coach) was reared with the Irish psyche and I can't understand why he doesn't explain to the Australians what we find acceptable and unacceptable. There needs to be an acknowledgement that there's a serious misunderstanding about the nature of the series."