INTERNATIONAL RULES: The GAA has acknowledged they were unhappy with some of the decisions taken by AFL official Mathew James in last Friday's first International Rules Test in Perth.

The Australian umpire was involved in some controversial decisions, principally the one that allowed Chris Johnson take and score a penalty at the end of the third quarter. Kepler Bradley was the player fouled by Anthony Lynch and yet Johnson, who had successfully taken a penalty in a previous series, stepped up and dispatched the kick.

James explained afterwards to officials he had made the error because of lack of familiarity with penalty awards, which don't exist in the AFL.

GAA reaction comes in the wake of reports James was being advised on the taking of legal action against former Ireland coach Colm O'Rourke in respect of remarks made by the latter in his newspaper column, in which he strongly criticised the performance of the Australian umpire.

"I'll be speaking to Mathew about what's been written," said Bill Deller in Melbourne's Age, chief executive of the AFL Umpires Association. "We'll seek legal guidance and they can advise Mathew on what to do if he wants to take action. He would have to fund it himself because we don't have the money to do that."

Pat Daly, Croke Park's director of games, represents the GAA on the match committee and he said queries would be raised both at committee and with the match officials, James and Ireland's David Coldrick.

"Overall it was satisfactory," said Daly, but there would be a few calls on the Australian side with which we wouldn't be happy: the penalty because the fouled player didn't take it, there were one or two 'swinging' incidents and one or two occasions guys were grabbed when it was questionable whether they were in possession.

"I think the benefit of the doubt in our minds should have been given to the guy trying to play the ball away with his fist."

According to Daly the much criticised decision not to proceed with a practice match took its toll on the officiating as well as on the Irish players' ability to assimilate the rules. "The fact that we had no warm-up game was a hindrance in that regard. It was a problem because it meant that the glitches you'd iron out weren't spotted until the first Test."

He was also critical of the foul committed by Australia's Russell Robertson, which earned the big Melbourne player a yellow card and left Tom Kelly pole-axed after being hit in the chest by a late challenge.

"Basically he got a yellow card, which could have been red. It's up to the referees if they want to cite a player afterwards. It was top of yellow, borderline red. What we are trying to do is establish a template: was it late, was it high, was it avoidable? If so there's a match ban attaching to it. You have to come up with objective criteria."

Robertson infuriated the Irish team management by smiling his way back to the sideline after the incident. "There is that macho element about the Aussies," according to Daly, "and if the guy got a match ban I don't think he could feel hard done by."

The match committee will go through a video of the match, discuss what the officials got right, wrong and what was borderline before talking to James and Coldrick.

According to Daly the charge that James had done most of the decision-making came from a very lop-sided third quarter when Ireland were over-run and the ball almost constantly in the Irish half.

"That perception largely came about in the third quarter. Probably David should have said half way through, 'You head up this side for 10 minutes because all the play is down that end'."

He declined to comment on O'Rourke's allegation beyond restating the match committee's desire to achieve consistency.

"That's a matter for Colm O'Rourke. The way I would look at it is that we try to ensure that refereeing is fair and that the rules are applied consistently."