Daithí Regan has said that Davy Fitzgerald let his players down with his behaviour in Sunday’s League semi-final loss to Tipperary,
.The Wexford manager went into the middle of the field to confront referee Diarmuid Kirwan during the first-half, but ended up in a shoving match with opposition players Niall O’Meara and Jason Forde.
He was appealing for a foul in the lead up to Tipp’s second goal, and said in a post-game interview that the intervention was pre-meditated to break their momentum.
Regan, an All-Ireland winner with Offaly, believes Fitzgerald wasn’t in control and “lost the plot”.
“I think he's let Wexford down. It's back to typical Davy,” Regan told Off The Ball.
“To come out and say it was premeditated and that he went on the field to give his players a lift, that is rubbish.
“A lot of it down to basic manners and a bit of respect.
“To run out on the pitch and get involved, my own view when I saw it was the first Tipperary player should have left him on his arse. If you are a manager and you go out like that, that is what you deserve.
“This is serious stuff. Lads out there giving it everything they can, and an opposition manager coming on and antagonising players on the field. I guarantee you there are lots of other players who wouldn't have had the discipline the Tipp fellas would, and would have absolutely left him on the flat on his back.
“He is inciting opposition players on the field and that’s tantamount to really dangerous stuff. If a player struck him across the head with a hurl, where do we go from there?
“I hated the attitude afterward. You've done so well since you’ve got down there, you've raised the profile in Wexford, you've got a bunch of players of outstanding professionalism and who believe in what you are telling them what to do, and in what they are trying to do to represent Wexford. You then take so much away from that with this carry-on, imbecilic, childish carry-on, that was self-indulgent.
“And to try and brush it under the carpet – 'I'm getting my players going'. No, you're not.”
The Irish Examiner reported this morning that Wexford officials are confident Fitzgerald will escape with just a one-match ban.
If that is the case, Fitzgerald would be back in time for the Model county’s potential Leinster semi-final meeting with Kilkenny.