Paud O’Dwyer was the man in the middle refereeing the Carlow senior football final 12 months ago – but on Sunday he will be patrolling the sideline hoping to win the 2024 decider as joint manager of Palatine.
Indeed, it seems difficult to play a county final in Carlow without O’Dwyer these days – in August he was the referee for the drawn senior hurling showdown between Mount Leinster Rangers and St Mullins.
O’Dwyer, who officiated the 2023 National Hurling League final between Limerick and Kilkenny, is in his first year as joint manager of his adopted club alongside Eddie McGarry. Palatine face Rathvilly in the Carlow SFC final at Netwatch Cullen Park on Sunday, 4pm.
Having become one of the best-known hurling officials in the country after spending more than a decade on the GAA’s national panel of inter-county referees, O’Dwyer had to step away at the end of the 2023 season because of the stipulation that 50 years of age was the cut-off for eligibility to officiate at the top level.
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During his intercounty whistling career, O’Dwyer took charge of the 2015 All-Ireland minor hurling final when Galway beat Tipperary, the 2018 All-Ireland senior club hurling final replay when Cuala got the better of Na Piarsaigh, and the 2019 and 2021 Munster senior deciders when Limerick proved too strong for Tipp on both occasions.
Having joined the GAA’s national panel in 2011, he operated at the top level of the small-ball code until 2023. But he’s juggling between the whistle and the tactics board these days.
“I had been a selector in 2022 and 2023 but when our manager [Pado Flynn] stepped down it created an opening,” says O’Dwyer.
“I had coached a lot of the players at underage, as had Eddie, so we had a chat and decided to put our names forward. We believed there was the nucleus of a good team there between the older guys and the younger guys coming through.”
They are now just one win away from what would be the club’s eighth county senior football triumph.
O’Dwyer is originally from Wexford and grew up playing with Rathgarogue Cushinstown but after first moving to Carlow for college and subsequently running a local bar in the town that was frequented by Palatine club members, he was eventually persuaded to throw his lot in with the Bennekerry outfit.
O’Dwyer and McGarry were both part of Palatine’s 2006 championship-winning team – which was the club’s first senior football success since 1952.
“I was beaten in five senior football finals, so thank God at least we won one,” says O’Dwyer.
He also picked up a Carlow junior hurling title in 2001, but the end of his playing days would not signal the end of his time on the pitch – quite the opposite, in fact.
With threats hanging over clubs about losing access to All-Ireland final tickets if they didn’t nominate a member to become a referee, O’Dwyer was nudged towards picking up the whistle. The rest, as the saying goes, is history.
“I certainly didn’t set out with any aspirations whatsoever,” he says. “But I started to enjoy it and got a county final in Carlow quickly enough. Then you went forward to Leinster and the next aim was the national panel and then the goal was to referee at Croke Park. I got way more out of it than I ever thought I would.
“I started refereeing late though, which might be a small bit of a regret, but at the same time I wouldn’t have stopped playing either.”
Timing is everything for referees, not just when stuck in the middle of a match. The GAA’s policy that referees must retire at the age of 50, introduced in 2011, continues to generate debate.
O’Dwyer officiated in both the Munster and Leinster senior hurling championships in 2023, but by 2024 he was ineligible to be considered for the national panel because of the age limit.
John Keenan, who refereed the 2023 All-Ireland final, had to retire ahead of the 2024 season too because of the age restriction.
“I would have made representation to see about changing the rule because I don’t think it is fair,” explains O’Dwyer.
“I can understand some of the reasoning behind it, but overall it doesn’t make a lot of sense.
“I was passing fitness tests, John Keenan was passing fitness tests. How can you go from choosing a man who is good enough to referee the 2023 All-Ireland final to after the game saying, ‘now you are too old to referee next season’.
“If referees at the age of 52 or 53 are passing fitness tests and performing on the field, I don’t see why they can’t continue.
“There could be a rule that if they fail a fitness test then they are gone, I’d have no issue with that, but if they are still capable and still fit enough, I don’t see why they shouldn’t be allowed continue.
“And [the GAA is] crying out for referees, there are not a huge amount of young lads coming through, sooner or later it might come back to bite.”
Given his involvement with Palatine, O’Dwyer hasn’t officiated any senior club football championship games in Carlow this season but he has still averaged about one match per week between hurling fixtures and junior and intermediate football.
But this week his only focus is Sunday’s final.
“With a club like Palatine, your aspiration always has to be to make the county final and when you are there to then try win it – but wanting to do that and actually achieving it are two very different things.”
You can whistle that.
