They had long since decided that Owens was ruining their day. Ben O\u2019Connor came into the press conference afterwards and complained that he didn\u2019t feel Cork had committed double the amount of fouls that Limerick<\/a> had. He was right, they didn\u2019t. But nor had they conceded double the amount of frees. The final count was 18-13 against them<\/a>. <\/p>\n Was that total a fair reflection of the game? The manic half-hour after the final whistle was no time to hope for accuracy in that assessment. Too much adrenaline flowing, too many slights and grumbles flying around in the ether. But what happens after a good night\u2019s sleep, a mug of decent coffee and a review of the video? Let\u2019s find out.<\/p>\n We sat down on Monday morning and went through every free awarded \u2013 as well those where Owens kept his whistle down from his mouth. In one sense, this is deeply, deeply unfair on the Wexford referee. There were 36 players on the pitch in Cork on Sunday and two managers on the sideline \u2013 none of them are having their performance examined in minute detail and none of them would appreciate the intrusion if it happened.<\/p>\n But since Owens became such a lightning rod for criticism after the game, it feels only right that his calls should be analysed. Not to add to the pile-on, more to give an accurate breakdown of what happened. If you\u2019re going to hammer the ref, you better be sure of your ground.<\/p>\n So here it is. Owens gave 31 frees in the game. Of those, 23 were absolute, stone-cold, no argument decisions. As it happens, three of those 23 were initially criticised by either commentator Marty Morrissey or Brendan Cummins on co-comms, before one or other of them rowed back upon seeing a replay. Owens, of course, saw no replays.<\/p>\n Of the remaining eight frees awarded, three were what any reasonable neutral would classify as 50\/50 calls. An example would be the time Tim O\u2019Mahony stood up Diarmaid Byrnes by the sideline under the North Stand four minutes before half-time. It wasn\u2019t dangerous, it was more just a physical clash between two huge men and its equivalent was let go several times in the game. Byrnes wouldn\u2019t have been crying if he hadn\u2019t got it, put it that way.<\/p>\n The 50\/50 calls are one place Cork can legitimately feel a little aggrieved. All three of them went Limerick\u2019s way. Had Byrnes been done for overcarrying instead, it would have been a free in for Cork on the Limerick 45. Out by the sideline, so no gimme. But scoreable, no question.<\/p>\n That leaves five frees over the course of the game that were, to these eyes anyway, simply the wrong call. Four of these resulted in frees awarded against Cork, two against Shane Barrett and one each against Se\u00e1n O\u2019Donoghue and Alan Connolly. The one against O\u2019Donoghue in the 42nd minute was particularly harsh, since Aaron Gillane grabbed his arm going down and should have conceded a free out. O\u2019Donoghue paid a heavy price too \u2013 already on a yellow, he was hauled ashore almost immediately.<\/p>\n Two calls in particular infuriated the Cork crowd, just short of the hour mark. They were both down by the Limerick endline as first Se\u00e1n Finn and two minutes later Darragh O\u2019Donovan came out with the ball. Connolly\u2019s challenge on Finn was feather-light. O\u2019Donovan bought his free from Barrett, ducking into his oxter and collapsing to the floor. Neither of them were fouls, plain and simple.<\/p>\n Two of these wrong calls resulted in points for Limerick. On the Cork side, they were awarded one free in error \u2013 against Byrnes in the second half when Barrett was holding his arm on the way. Connolly slotted it between the posts.<\/p>\n And what about the non-calls? Well look, in any game of hurling, you can see dozens more frees than are actually given, if that\u2019s what you\u2019re into. For the most part, it isn\u2019t what hurling people are into. Indeed, the most widely-held gripe against Owens on Sunday was that he called too many frees and should have swallowed the whistle a bit more.<\/p>\n But for what it\u2019s worth, we counted another nine times in the game where he could have called fouls. Five of those would have resulted in a free for Cork, four of them for Limerick. That\u2019s without counting the Limerick claims for a penalty in the first half, which looked more or less the equal of the one given to Cork at the other end.<\/p>\n So, what does it all mean? The free count was 18-13. Three 50\/50s went against Cork, four wrong calls went against them too, costing them a net total of two points. Including the penalty, the balance of non-calls against the two sides more or less evened themselves out over the course of the day.<\/p>\n That said, Owens clearly didn\u2019t have a great game. After going the first 12 minutes of the first game between these two teams last month without giving a single free, he was in more pedantic form on Sunday. He got himself into a bind by calling small fouls early. Even though they were mostly correct, he walked himself into a Pringles performance \u2013 once he popped, he clearly felt he couldn\u2019t stop.<\/p>\n Did he cost Cork their Munster title, though? Well, if you\u2019re red-nosed and spittle-flecked from screaming like a loon as Owens walked down the tunnel, you can certainly decide that\u2019s the case. But in reality, your team went the whole of the second half of a Munster final without managing a single point attempt from play. <\/p>\n That probably had more to do with the outcome than anything the referee did.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The ugliest sight on Sunday in P\u00e1irc U\u00ed Chaoimh came at the end, as James Owens and his…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":489158,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[92418,61,60,179004,112,150815],"class_list":["post-489157","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-hurling-championship","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-munster-hurling-championship","tag-sports","tag-weekend-that-was"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489157","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=489157"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/489157\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/489158"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=489157"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=489157"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=489157"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Referee](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/EMX7OCM2AO2VYPDTZGAFUSJ3VU.jpg\")
Referee James Owens with Cork players after the final whistle against Limerick. Photograph: Tom O\u2019Hanlon\/Inpho <\/p>\n![\"Referee](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/BQAYXV5TK22GBXR4O675CCQEGU.jpg\")
Referee James Owens yellow cards Se\u00e1n O’Donoghue of Cork. Photograph: James Crombie\/Inpho <\/p>\n