Christy O'Connor: GAA face dilemma over handpass as swarm tackling has changed hurling

WHEN Waterford played Clare in the hurling league back in February, Paddy Leavy’s individual performance was such a dominant theme of the game that the post-match commentary on his unique style was almost threatening to trend online.

It’s rare for a player still trying to establish himself at inter-county to generate such discussion, but it was easy to see why. 

Leavy had made a name for himself with how often he uses the ‘Brick Flick’ with Ballygunner, but he took the art to a whole new level at inter-county that afternoon against Clare; of Leavy’s 24 plays, he executed the ‘Brick Flick’ on 17 occasions.

The original skill is named after Michael ‘Brick’ Walsh, who had perfected flicking the ball away with one hand, as opposed to using the handpass. 

Walsh though, only used the skill a handful of times in a match, whereas it is almost Leavy’s first instinct when he’s in possession.

Against Clare, Leavy struck the ball just four times in an orthodox manner. 

INFLUENCE

He still had a huge influence on the match; Leavy was involved in the build-up to 1-7, while he also scored one point. Leavy was on the ball more often than any other player that afternoon – mostly because he was operating as a sweeper – but he always took the right option, and was turned over just once in possession.

Leavy is the ultimate modern embodiment of Walsh’s rich legacy, but he’s also become somewhat of a poster boy for the purists who wish to see more improvisation and clarity around short-passing, especially hand-passing, as opposed to the vagueness and confusion around so much of the skill - especially when so many handpasses now are deemed to be illegal; former referee Barry Kelly said recently that 75% of handpasses are fouls.

That is just a by-product of the modern environment. 

With so much emphasis now on carrying the ball, taking it into contact and trying to break the tackle, the only way to release the sliotar when the ball-carrier is held up is with a hand-pass.

A legal hand-pass is meant to feature two distinct movements, a “release” and a “striking action”. 

Yet the game has become so fast and players are trying to shift the ball so quickly before being ensnared by a mob of tacklers that illegal hand-passing is becoming prevalent in the inter-county game now.

SPIKE

The spike in the volume of handpasses has been obvious in recent seasons. 

In the 2017 and 2018 seasons the average number of hand-passes per game was in the low 70s; a year later it had climbed into the mid-80s. Now? The average is over 100.

Blowing for indiscretions of illegal handpasses disrupts the flow of a game, especially if the pass has released the receiver into a scoring position. 

Yet hurling’s integrity is being compromised if the rule is being disregarded ahead of being implemented.

Redefining the handpass was one of the two experimental rules trialled during the Higher Education’s Freshers Division 1 Hurling Leagues late last year, where players had three options: play the sliotar away with the opposite hand to that holding the ball; play the sliotar away with the original ball-holding hand after bouncing it off the hurley; play the sliotar away with the opposite hand after bouncing it off the hurley.

When Gaelic Stats collated the information from a total of nine games between October and December, one of the standout trends to emerge was a tendency for players to opt for a stick pass over a handpass, with the ratio of stick passes to handpasses running at 8.0. As a comparison, in the 2023 All-Ireland senior championship, there were 1.5 stick passes for every handpass.

There is a big difference between comparing Freshers hurling and the senior intercounty game, especially in terms of intensity, but the findings give credence to further trialling the handpass experiment when it encourages greater use of the hurley.

With so much gang-tackling and rucks now, it’s often difficult for referees to even see the ball. 

The game is so fast that the action has often moved on to the next phase of play before the referee could even attempt to judge if the ball had been thrown or hand-passed properly.

With referees struggling to apply consistency to a rule that is so hard to police, new regulations would add clarity for the referees because they’d immediately know if the ball was released from that hand. 

FRUSTRATION

It would also offer clarity to the players because there is increasing frustration when some are being penalised for what looks like a legitimate pass.

Any new rule changes would require a whole new culture change in ball transition with the hand. 

On the flipside, that could also lead to more unintended consequences. Having to play the sliotar away with the opposite hand or after bouncing it off the hurley could lead to more coaching around how to negate that handpass as the execution of the skill takes longer.

If the ball is slapped onto the ground from a hand-chop from an opposition player, that could lead to more rucks. 

In turn, that may lead to more swarming because there is more of a chance of forcing the dispossession, and invariably having more numbers around the breakdown.

The report from the recent experimental rules trial is now with Central Council, who will determine what the next steps should be. 

Yet the question remains as to whether the problems around the handpass are sufficiently impactful to justify such a fundamental change to playing the game.