Brian Fenton: I was proud of never having been red carded

Brian Fenton spent Dublin's Leinster championship opener against Meath watching at home in the company of Marty Morrissey and Eamonn Fitzmaurice, occasionally flicking over to the Premier League on Sky.

His appeal against his red card in the league final had fallen at the CCCC hurdle and, in a break with established tradition, Fenton chose not to exhaust every possible avenue of appeal.

The two-time Footballer of the Year had sought the appeal mainly on the grounds that he had never been sent off at club or county level and was keen to overturn it on that basis alone.

"I was proud of that, I was proud to be a player that had never been sent off," Fenton told RTÉ Sport on Tuesday.

"It was more (a case of) appealing on that side. I know for sure it shouldn't and won't happen again - I can say that now and I'll be in the thick of it in an All-Ireland semi-final or something (trails off)...

"No straight red, no two yellows in one game, nothing. And that was part of the plea, good behaviour. It just has never been part of my game.

"Look, in retrospect, there will be that asterisk against my name. But I don't think I will be too ashamed of it down the line. It's not the worst thing that has been done on a Gaelic pitch, I suppose.

"I kind of said to Dessie, 'look, give it one crack maybe.' Because I didn't want to be a distraction for the team on match-week.

"We had a look at it and thought appealing it would be a good exercise but obviously the CCCC and that committee just chose to uphold it, which is fair enough, I was disappointed obviously but you just have to respect it and move on.

"I didn't know anything about the first level of appeals, I don't know anything about the second level of appeals, so I said, 'look, we'll leave well