Lcathabl TO HAND TYRONE ALL-IRELAND LIFT
ALL-STAR Tyrone attacker Cathal Mcshane is confident he’ll be fit for the Championship despite making slow progress with a ‘rare’ ankle injury.
Powerful Mcshane was stretchered off against Galway in the Allianz League in February after damaging his ankle, inset, and underwent surgery.
But the 24-year-old told Benetti Menswear ambassador Tomas O Se that he’s optimistic about resuming inter-county activity in mid-october.
Mcshane said: “The injury is coming on. If I’m being honest it has been slow. Obviously with the football being cancelled, there’s pros and cons.
“The pros are you’re not missing any matches and it gives you time to do the rehab and get back to where you want to be. The downside is that maybe you’re not getting access to physios and stuff like that as you would normally three nights a week.
“There’s been good days and bad days but the main thing is that you just keep at it and you trust in the process.”
With GAA chiefs pencilling in October 17 as a return to play date for inter-county action, Mcshane is upbeat about being available.
He said: “Definitely, you have to hope for that. Obviously it’s a good bit away. I have a few months now to get myself back again.
“I believe with the restrictions being lifted
I hope to be involved when the football starts back up
slightly that might allow me to see the physio more often. I’m not 100% sure on that, I’ll just play it by ear but you’d have to hope that, yeah, I’ll be involved, once the football starts back up again.”
Mcshane was joint top scorer in the 2019 SFC with 3-48 and bagged his first All-star.
He was contacted by the Adelaide
Crows shortly after the award and agreed to a two-week trial that he felt went well.
Mcshane, who hit 0-2 in the 2018 All-ireland final, said: “Once it was finished we sat down and had a meeting and they wanted me to stay, they were interested in me staying out there.
“I said no, I had to get home to speak to my family and speak to people that are close to me, important people and I stuck by that, I felt I had to do that so that’s what I did.
“When I arrived back home, and it wasn’t until I arrived back home, that I said, ‘You know what, I’m in a good place back here’. It was just the simple things, your family, friends, team-mates, the small things and obviously I got the career pathway with Keystone set up so that was a big opportunity for me too, to progress my career not just on the field but off it.
“There were loads of things I had to weigh up.
“I’m so happy with the decision I made, I feel it’s the right decision and I’m very, very content.”