Jarlath Burns made it clear that Armagh had no part to play in a replay being ordered following their loss to Laois

FORMER Armagh midfielder Jarlath Burns has said that the county must preserve their integrity by playing their controversial replay with Laois.

Mick Lillis’s side prevailed in last Saturday’s Qualifier win at O’Moore Park, but it emerged after the game that Laois had used an extra substitute when Shane Murphy came on as a black card replacement for Brendan Quigley in the 73rd minute.

That led to the GAA’s Central Competitions Control Committee meeting on Monday and they decided that a replay, rather than a fine or forfeiture of the game, was the right course of action.

The match is scheduled for July 2, but there has still been no confirmation that Armagh will fulfill the fixture. Burns, however, believes that their integrity depends on it.

“Armagh have to fulfill the fixture,” said the former Orchard captain.

“This has been laid down by the CCCC as a fixture that Armagh have to fulfill.

“I think the Armagh County Board have acted with real integrity during all of this.

“I was contacted by a member of the public about it on Sunday evening who knew I was going on The Sunday Game.

“I decided not to mention it because I didn’t want in any way to jeopardise any process that would emerge as a result of it.

“Kieran McGeeney never mentioned it, the Armagh County Board didn’t issue a statement, they didn’t ask for anything.

“If it had been up to the Armagh County Board to launch an objection, my understanding is that they weren’t going to do that.

“I’m not speaking for anyone other than myself, but I would be close to members of the Armagh County Board and they didn’t go looking for anything.

“I think in order to preserve their integrity they must fulfill the fixture.”

Burns has taken a particular interest in the process as he is the current chairman of the GAA’s Standing Committee on Playing Rules.

The incident comes just weeks after a replay was ordered following the miscalculation of scores in the Antrim and Meath Christy Ring final.

Burns has warned against any strong reaction to the two incidents though.

“I suppose the difficulty now is the extra stuff, the black card rule, the blood sub rule, every so often something like this will happen,” he said.

“It hasn’t happened, to the best of my knowledge, at county level and for all the games we have, it’s very rare.

“I wouldn’t think there would need to be a knee-jerk reaction required.

“It’s a bit of human error. People can blame this and blame that and blame Croke Park and blame the GAA, these things can happen, and do happen, in professional sport as well.

“There’s always the possibility for human error and the same thing happened in the Christy Ring final between Meath and Antrim, human error occurred.”

With James Morgan and Mark Shields ruled out through injury and Niall Grimley set for America, Armagh’s squad for the replay could be threadbare.

Burns is hoping that his former teammate Kieran McGeeney can get the available players into the right state of mind for the match.

“There won’t be the pressure and there won’t be the hype so maybe they can go out without caution and just play,” he said.

“Every player should go out and enjoy themselves and express themselves and play to the best of their ability.”