Dooher ‘defied all logic’

SEAN CAVANAGH admitted he thought Brian Dooher’s inter-county career was over but is now sure the Tyrone captain will be as good as ever against Down on Sunday.

Dooher played his first game since last year’s All-Ireland semi-final in August when starting in the Red Hands’ first round victory over Antrim last month, having spent the winter dogged by persistent groin trouble and concentrated on rehab during the league.

Even though Dooher is renowned for his manic dedication to training, Cavanagh was still surprised by his teammate’s fitness when he returned to the fold in April.

Now he is excited by how much improvement that game will bring to the almost 35-year-old, as well as the likes of Stephen O’Neill, who had also only recently returned from injury.

“If someone had asked me six or seven months ago ‘is Dooher going to come back?’ “I would have said, ‘not a chance, his pelvis is hanging off’.

“He’s just defied all logic. He’s come back and he’s in outstanding shape at the minute. He’s done fitness tests and he’s outran the beep test!

“He’s certainly in great shape and the game time will only do him good. It’s great to see that we trained (the first night after the game) and he was back out. In the past maybe it would have taken his body a wee bit of time to recover but he was back out doing a wee bit. Stevie (O’Neill) was there as well.

“To have those guys back on the training field is a huge lift.”

Cavanagh sees a lot of comparisons between this season and 2008, when Tyrone last won the All-Ireland, in terms of it beginning with a lot of injuries.

What he is hoping is that it will end, as it did two years ago, with everyone in peak condition and Dooher lifting the Sam Maguire Cup.

“We’re maybe late this year coming back out and we haven’t done as much training as some of the other teams have.

“I know Dublin were in great physical shape the day we played them up in Omagh. They beat us well and deservedly so but that was probably a huge factor in that as well.

“We hope this year is almost going to be a bit like 2008 where we were carrying an awful lot of injuries into that year as well and even though we did go out early to Down in the championship, we had seven or eight weeks to get ourselves up to speed physically.

“If we can keep the injuries away and get ourselves back up to speed the players and the talent is there to go far this year.”

And of course, it’s Down again this time around.

Cavanagh is expecting a very stern challenge but even though Down dug out a victory over Donegal in their first round tie, he reckons there is evidence they will revert to what is more natural to them if put under pressure.

“Down are a side I thought at the start of the year were going to push on. They’re going to be a really dangerous side. They’re going to be a handful. When you’re playing Down, the one thing they’ll probably admit themselves is that they’re a bit like Real Madrid.

“They have some fantastic forwards, like Martin Clarke, Benny Coulter and all the rest. Sometimes their defence just lets them down. I think that’s what let them down in the league final against Armagh.”