Donal Óg Cusack: Refs need more support from officials

RTÉ hurling analysts Donal Óg Cusack and Ursula Jacob argued that referees weren't receiving adequate support from their teams of officials after reviewing a number of incidents in Saturday's Leinster and Munster championship games.

The games in Wexford and Walsh Park saw a number of contentious incidents, the most notable being James Owens running across the eyeline of Tipp goalkeeper Barry Hogan for Waterford's early penalty, an incident which Cusack labelled "bizarre."

While Cusack was content to write this off as just a "mistake", the former Cork goalkeeper cited a few incidents across both games where he felt the referee's supporting cast on the sideline and behind the goal weren't serving him well.

"It's worth making the point, you'd want to be a very brave person to be a referee," Cusack said. "You'd want to be a very brave person to be a hurling referee.

"But because of the challenges they have - there's so much going on - they need their umpires on the ball, which they're not in general, and also their linesmen helping them and very often they're not doing that either."

"The onus and the burden of responsibility shouldn't just be on the referee," added four-time All-Ireland winner Jacob.

"It's about the team of officials. A management team works together, group of players work together so a team of officials have to do the same, to support the referee to make the best decision possible."