A ban on hand-passed goals is one of six rule changes which will be trialed throughout the 2020 National Camogie League campaign.
Players will still be able to score a point with a hand-pass but in addition, players will also no longer be permitted to drop the hurley intentionally.
The Camogie Association are experimenting with the new rules during the league campaign ahead of potential proposals for permanent playing rule changes at the Association’s Annual Congress in 2021.
Among the other changes, a player will be allowed to take a free from their hand if fouled inside their own 45-metre line but the player that is fouled must take it themselves and it will be an indirect free.
There will also be a change to how penalties are taken.
The penalty must now be struck from on or outside the 20-metre line but not inside it and only one defending player may stand on the goal-line during a penalty and shall not move towards the 20m-metre line before the ball has been struck.
The change to the puckout rule should help speed up play.
The referee will now blow the whistle once only, to signal a wide/score and from that moment the sliotar is back in play and the goalkeeper is free to restart the game via a puck-out from the correct position.
With regard to discipline, a player who is now deemed to be persistently fouling another player (two deliberate fouls) will be given a “tick” by the referee.
If that player commits one more foul, it will merit a yellow card.
And a player may now use minimal contact on an opponent’s body from side-on, once they are making a reasonable effort to gain possession of the ball.
Camogie Association president Kathleen Woods is hoping that the new changes will have a positive impact on the game.
"These Trial Playing Rules are an important step for the Association to ensure that our game remains fit for purpose for many years to come," said Woods.
"We have listened to a range of key stakeholders involved in our game and I hope that this process will be of benefit in order for us to tweak our playing rules in the future to allow our wonderful game to continue to grow and flourish as it has done in recent years."
A training process will take place in the coming weeks involving the Association’s National Referee Panel.
There will also be workshops which will be held in early 2020 for players and managers who will participate in the National League as well as a series of trial matches which will be organised across other grades of the game as part of this process.
The Trial Playing Rules initiative will be supported by a body of work to monitor, track and analyse their implementation, with a view to providing objective feedback from which final decisions regarding motions to the Association’s Annual Congress regarding permanent rule changes can be made.
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