A fascinating documentary series on top level referees goes to air on Setanta Sports tonight.
Produced by Aeterno Productions and starting with former League of Ireland official Alan Kelly, Men In Black follows four Irish referees across four different sporting codes: Kelly, Alain Rolland (rugby), David Coldrick (Gaelic football) and Barry Kelly (hurling).
All four are mic'ed up and tonight we were joined by director Cillian O'Conchuir and Rolland to discuss the making of the documentary.
O'Conchuir explains how the doc shows Alan Kelly dealing with an angry Steven Gerrard during a match between Liverpool and Celtic, while the Gaelic football experience was far less vocal than he expected as the cameras and mic's followed Coldrick.
Rolland also had to deal with an angry France rugby international, Pascal Pape, and the Irish referee joined us on the line to discuss the experience of refereeing and taking part in the documentary.
With rugby referees already mic'ed up at elite level, he chatted about the challenges of knowing that everyone can hear what is said.
"I'm a firm believer that you need to speak somebody's language for them to really understand. But being mic'ed up doesn't necessarily allow you to do so, unlike when you're doing games away from TV. So if you want to have a stern word with someone, you can do so," said Rolland.
But he also gave his take on the latest Luis Suarez biting incident and how he would deal with a situation when a player approaches him, claiming to have been bitten.
"I'm absolutely stunned that we're talking about this again. I've had it where somebody comes up and he's stuck out his arm and you see teeth marks. But there isn't a lot you can actually do because you will never know unless you see the incident," said Rolland.
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