Sport

Four-week ban leaves Kerry pair free for final

Kerry will have both Tomás Ó Sé and Tom O'Sullivan available for the All-Ireland football final later this month, writes Seán…

Fri Sept 06 2002 - 01:00

Kerry will have both Tomás Ó Sé and Tom O'Sullivan available for the All-Ireland football final later this month, writes Seán Moran

O'Sullivan, who was sent off in the semi-final win over Cork, and Ó Sé, who was found on video evidence to have struck a player in the same match although he received only a yellow card, both received four-week suspensions, which will expire the night before the meeting with Armagh.

Cork's Philip Clifford was handed an eight-week suspension following an incident in the same game. Video evidence showed him striking and as he had committed the same offence within the previous 48 weeks - during this year's National League match against Sligo - the minimum suspension was doubled.

The red card imposed on Clifford's teammate Fionán Murray of Cork was rescinded, based on video evidence, while no further action was taken against Colin Corkery of Cork who apologised for his actions on the day and also confirmed that he did not make some media comments attributed to him in relation to the referee.

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Whereas he accepted the comments he had made about the referee "showing disrespect" he denied that he had called Brian White of Wexford a "disgrace".

Liam Watson of Antrim was suspended for 12 weeks from the date of his last game in relation to an incident in the All-Ireland hurling quarter-final against Tipperary. Watson was seen to strike Paul Ormonde of Tipperary with his hurl after the two had clashed.

In other news, the Tipperary county board have said that there has been no indication from hurling manager Nicky English concerning his future. This was his fourth year in charge of the county.

"We've given Nicky a bit of space to decide on this," says Liz Howard, Tipperary county PRO.

Meanwhile Longford's John Bannon has been appointed by the Central Referees Appointments Committee of the GAA to take charge of the All-Ireland football final.

A member of the Legan Sarsfields club, Bannon is one of the most experienced referees in the country and took charge of the 1998 All-Ireland final between Galway and Kildare.

More recently he refereed the 2000 All-Ireland semi-final between this month's finalists. At the time he was criticised by Armagh for the amount of injury-time he played in the first, drawn match between the counties. Armagh led by an injury-time point from captain Kieran McGeeney but in the 74th minute Bannon awarded a free to Kerry, which Maurice Fitzgerald dramatically converted to force the replay.

The minor final will be refereed by Michael Ryan of Limerick.

Meanwhile, Niall Moran is involved in a race against time to be ready for Limerick's All-Ireland under-21 hurling final against Galway in Thurles on Sunday week. Moran sustained a fractured thumb in a training session on Wednesday and has already been ruled out of training for the next week.

Better news is that defender Michael O'Donnell is making a good recovery from his ligament problems.

• This Saturday's Women's All-Ireland football semi-final between Monaghan and Waterford will be broadcast live from Portlaoise by TG4. The 'Peil na mBan Beo' programme will be presented by Micheál Ó Domhnaill with commentary and analysis by Brian Tyers and Denise Horan, the Mayo goalkeeper who will have a particular interest in this match as her team play Dublin next week in the other semi-final, which will also be broadcast on TG4.