LOUGHREA HAVE BEEN handed a massive boost on the eve of the All-Ireland senior club hurling final with the news that midfielder Cullen Killeen has been cleared to play in Sunday’s Croke Park showpiece.

Killeen successfully had his suspension overturned on Friday night following a last-ditch appeal to the GAA’s Disputes Resolution Authority, and is now free to line out against Ballygunner.

The midfielder was sent off in the final minutes of Loughrea’s semi-final win for striking Slaughtneil’s Brendan Rogers with his hurl, but failed in efforts to have his one-match ban thrown out by the Central Hearings Committee and Central Appeals Committee.

At Friday night’s hearing in Dublin, the DRA’s three-man independent panel reviewed both of Killeen’s previous hearings and found that the CAC had failed to spot a “misapplication” of the GAA’s disciplinary rules in the initial CHC hearing.

A DRA statement said: “The CAC determined… that the Central Hearings Committee (CHC) heard the evidence submitted by the Claimant and reviewed the video and decided that the evidence was not compelling such as to rebut the Referee’s Report.

“It is clear from the CHC’s minutes and its decision that that was not the test that was applied.”

As a result, the DRA overturned Killeen’s ban, freeing him to play.