Advertisement
Jason Ryan with his Kildare players. INPHO/Cathal Noonan
Comeback

Good news for Kildare football fans as injured players set for return

The Lilywhites have had to operate without some key players in recent weeks.

KILDARE HOPE TO have injury victims Ollie Lyons and Padraig Fogarty back in harness for their Division 1 league meeting with Tyrone on March 2nd.

Kildare lost out to Cork yesterday in Páirc Uí Rinn after winning their opening day clash against Mayo in Newbridge.

Manager Jason Ryan is hopeful that he can welcome back defender Lyons and attacker Fogarty, who struck four goals in Kildare’s O’Byrne Cup semi-final last month against UCD.

“Ollie should be fine for the Tyrone game. He has a slight knock and a slight strain on his hamstring so he should be alright. Podge Fogarty, exactly the same thing.

“Maybe Podge could have played yesterday but the risk a hamstring injury is, if you have a slight hamstring injury and you do serious damage to it, you’re gone for six weeks. If that was the case with Podge, he would miss pretty much the whole National League.”

Kildare lost Emmet Bolton at half-time of yesterday’s game as he limped off with an injruy.

“Emmet came in with a bit of a knock on his knee and mobility-wise, he wasn’t where we needed it to be”, revealed Ryan. “In the middle area, you can’t afford anybody who’s not moving. You need guys that are able to motor all the way through.”

Ryan reiterated his view that Kildare are in a transitional phase at the moment.

“We’re very much in transition. We have a lot of lads coming through. A lot of the senior fellas that you would be hoping – the spine of the team – they’re not going to be around for a while yet (due to injuries).

“So we’re a team trying to get as many points as we can as fast as we can during the league. They’re very impressionable players who are very new to the inter-county scene, a number of them. So we’re trying to get them playing as confidently as they possibly can.

“We’re lucky that we’ve a number of weeks to prepare for the Tyrone game. We played Tyrone three times last year and lost all three. So without using the O’Byrne Cup as a gauge or without using the first two games as a gauge, the Tyrone game will be interesting.”

Cork stay unbeaten in Division 1 as they get the better of Kildare

As it happened: Cork v Kildare, Allianz Division 1 football league