Joe Brolly said Matt Fitzpatrick has suffered "huge distress" during the drawn out saga which ended with his proposed 48-week ban being overturned by Croke Park’s Central Appeals Committee (CAC) and labelled the Central Hearings Committee's conduct during the case "a disgrace".
Fitzpatrick was handed the suspension after the GAA ruled that he deliberately misled an investigation into an incident that occurred during Antrim’s Allianz Football League clash with Armagh in March.
Twice the Central Competition Control Committee (CCCC) were unable to identify the Antrim player involved and twice Fitzpatrick escaped a sanction.
However, new video evidence came to light and on review the Central Hearings Committee (CHC) decided that Fitzpatrick had misled them.
The Antrim man, represented by barrister Brolly, exercised his right to an appeal and on Wednesday night the Central Appeals Committee (CAC) overturned the ban.
"The big problem with the GAA disciplinary system at the lower level, and the CCCC, is that it is ultra competitive, it's stacked against the player, it's an aggressive system," Brolly told RTE Radio 1's Saturday Sport.
"The saving grace of the GAA disciplinary system is the DRA.
"They don't take into account concepts like fairness, reasonableness... any of those things. So for example in the Matt Fitzpatrick case, he's a trainee school teacher, he's 24, never been sent off, a good kid, very well liked around the St John's club.
"He gets cited for this really minor incident that's spotted by the CCCC that doesn't look like a strike at all.
"When I watched the footage, and I know Matt, I couldn't identify him.
"The incident was totally unremarkable. How could the player be expected to remember it? I mean nothing happened. In any event he had to be exonerated.
"Matt Fitzpatrick wants to be a school teacher. He was in the front page of every newspaper as having been banned for a year for perjury, the GAA's equivalent of perjury, deliberately lying to a tribunal.
"You can imagine the huge distress he's suffered as a result of that. His family are seeking legal advice in relation to libel proceedings because what happens at the Central Hearings Committee is not privileged in law. It's not like the court. Really they're conduct has been a disgrace.
"The members of the CHC who were involved in that ought to resign. There's been huge damage done to Matt Fitzpatrick's reputation."
