SHAMROCK ROVERS ARE hopeful that Jack Byrne will be available for their opening game of the Premier Division season this Friday.
The Hoops begin the defence of their League of Ireland crown against Dundalk at Tallaght Stadium and the five-in-a-row chasing champions are awaiting the results of a MRI scan on Byrne’s calf before making a decision.
Rovers boss Stephen Bradley confirmed that the playmaker recovered fully from knee surgery before the end of last season and came through 30 minutes of an in-house game on Saturday looking sharp.
An issue with the 27-year-old’s calf required an ultrasound yesterday and while the results of that came back clear a further MRI test has been required.
“We’re hopefully looking at just days. If that is all clear as well he’s ready to go,” Bradley said.
“This is quite normal for someone coming back after a long layoff in terms of the load on different parts of your body taking stress. We are just trying to be cautious with him and not set him back over something silly. Hopefully, it’s days.”
“It was unfortunate that we couldn’t give him minutes last Friday [in the President's Cup]. Hopefully, if this is clear we can get him bac because he’s been able to work and he has been training. If he gets the all clear he is ready to go straight away.”
Bradley also revealed that captain Roberto Lopes won’t return to action with Rovers until next month. The Cape Verde international has been given the rest of February off following his involvement in the African Cup of Nations, and he will also be absent for a time in March during the next break.
“He wanted to be back at the end of this week, but we’ve told him to stay away until next month so he has a bit of time off. So he’ll miss three or four games,” Bradley said.
“He’ll be away again in March. That’s the joys of being an international player. It’s a positive, both he and (Estonian international) Markus [Poom] will be away. The important thing for Pico [Lopes] is that he gets the break now. A couple of years back he came in and we cut it short and mentally he was really fatigued throughout the year. We don’t want that again.
“We’ve taken the hit in terms of his missing the first maybe four or five games. For us, long-term, it’s worth it.”
Loan signing Aaron McEneff will not be available on Friday as he continues his recovery from a quad issue, striker Johnny Kenny returns to training on Monday while Graham Burke, Sean Hoare and Richie Towell will all be available for selection against Dundalk.
