Tipperary man John Moloney has refereed football and hurling at the highest level.
Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) football and hurling referee John Moloney is at Canon Hayes Park in Bansha, County Tipperary, the club grounds for Galtee Rovers – St. Pecaun's GAA Club.
To be successful as a senior club, attention must be paid to juvenile structures. John Moloney organises a league for local schoolboys from the parish of Bansha and Kilmoyler. His stewardship ensures a continuous supply of players to senior level.
John Moloney has been the referee for five senior All-Ireland Senior Football Finals and one All-Ireland Senior Hurling Final. He still referees games at club level.
He describes the first time he refereed a match as,
A famous occasion when a referee didn't turn up and I refereed in my Wellington boots.
The 1976 final of the Munster Senior Football Championship in Páirc Uí Chaoimh was the first big game John Moloney ever refereed. This game between Cork and Kerry ended in a draw and he was the man in the middle for the replay. Both matches stand out in his memory.
Fitness keeps John Moloney at the top of his game but also,
I love Gaelic games and I love referring and I get enormous enjoyment out of it.
Hurling is easier to referee as there are fewer fouls.
It’s faster, it’s more open, cleaner, a man has his two hands on the hurley pulling, football there's a lot of pulling and dragging.
John Moloney welcomes the imminent introduction of the yellow card to Gaelic Games,
I think it would help the game enormously.
He once gave the wrong score at the end of a Connacht Under-21 Championship Final,
Immediately this woman made a wild grab for my hair, but I survived and I’m still here, I live to tell the tale.
'Donncha’s Travelling Roadshow’ was a series presented by Donncha Ó Dúlaing highlighting the people, music and traditions of rural Ireland.
This episode of ‘Donncha’s Travelling Roadshow’ was broadcast on 28 March 1979.
