A LEADING Tyrone official has defended the decision to overrule a referee's report and exonerate county star Peter Canavan in the wake of disturbances at December's league final.

Frank Rodgers, secretary of the Tyrone Games Administration Committee (GAC), was responding to reports in the weekend's Sunday Independent and Sunday Tribune which drew attention to the referee's report which cited Canavan for physical interference with, and threatening language to, the referee.

Rodgers said the county's games administration committee (GAC) had reached its conclusion based on a preponderance of evidence that conflicted with the match official's report.

Canavan, who wasn't playing in the match between his club Errigal Ciarain and Carrickmore, was one of several names cited in the report of referee Michael Hughes, but he escaped the suspensions handed down to 11 others.

The GAC considered the referee's report, together with extensive witness and video evidence, before publishing its conclusions at the end of last month.

The incident arose when a fracas broke out at the end of the match on December 22nd last. The referee decided to abandon proceedings, obviously against the wishes of the Errigal Ciarain contingent whose club were leading by three points in injury time. Canavan was one of those who surrounded the referee to protest.

According to the referee's report, the Tyrone star "grabbed my jersey very forcibly and told me that if I abandoned the game, I would never leave the field". The matter earned additional notoriety with the death from a heart attack at the ground of an Errigal Ciarain member, Barney Horisk, whose son Paul was playing.

The Carrickmore club, which was suspended from the county league for 12 months, obviously feels that the punishment was disproportionate and the suspensions are being appealed to the full county board.

"Make no mistake," says Rodgers, "we would have had no difficulty in suspending Peter Canavan. He has to be treated like an ordinary player, but just because he's Peter Canavan doesn't mean that he doesn't get the benefit of the doubt. We had Peter Canavan in and he was questioned about the whole thing, and we also had all the other pieces of evidence.

"As far as Peter Canavan was concerned it would have been the easiest thing in the world to suspend him. From the point of view of adverse publicity, it was actually harder not to suspend him. We could have been cynical and suspended him for two months or something like that, but we decided he didn't deserve it.

"One of the neutral officials from the host club (Fintona) said that Peter Canavan said: `Don't leave the field until you finish it.' - an entirely different statement, just by the placing of the words, from what the referee had down.

"If the (referee's) report related to activity on the field of play, it's safe to say we probably wouldn't have done so (overruled it). But here we had a massive brawl, and news was just breaking about a man having died at the match and so on. One of the pieces of evidence that would have initiated the defence of Peter Canavan was that on video Peter Canavan was seen very, very clearly - he was injured and not playing - there getting the Errigal Ciarain players, trying to get them to move them to safety.

"Their idea was that the match would be restarted, and that they in injury time, leaders by three points, would be declared winners. A lot of Errigal Ciarain players were around him (the referee) pleading with him to finish the match. Peter would have joined that group of people.

"The evidence we got was that he never got near the referee and that he didn't say the words he was accused of saying.

"The evidence from umpires to linesmen would have diverged from what the referee had said. Generally speaking there would have been a lot of astonishment, a lot of amazement, as to how what was reported, was reported."

"He didn't name one side as the aggressors. He just said I spoke to my linesmen and umpires and I'm reporting the following players - five I think from Errigal Ciarain and six from Carrickmore - and he put them all down for striking. It was a real puzzlement, it just didn't tie in with what had actually happened, what he should have seen happening and what his umpires claim to have told him."

Meanwhile, last night's meeting of the Dublin county board passed off without incident despite speculation that the position of county football manager Mickey Whelan would be raised.

The outcome was in keeping with the comments of county secretary John Costello earlier in the day. "It's not just that there is no notice of motion on the management of the football team, but I haven't even heard anything about it back from the clubs. We are fully supportive of Mickey Whelan and his selectors."

Speculation had been triggered by Dublin's defeat against Louth in the opening Sunday of the resumed national league just over a week ago.

This effectively ruled the county out of the promotion race in Division Two, and even raised fears that relegation could end up on the agenda.

There are two reasons why this outbreak of angst was surprising. Firstly, Louth are the form team of the division and likely to win promotion. Losing to them in February scarcely rates as one of Dublin's worse league performances.

Secondly, a significant meeting of around a dozen senior players, just after Christmas, decided to set aside the disaffection prevalent between some of them and Whelan and to make a determined effort to be in optimum condition for the Leinster first round against All Ireland champions Meath on June 15th. Preparations since have apparently been progressing harmoniously.