Tyrone chiefs to probe McMahon broken jaw incident

THE Tyrone GAA board are to investigate an incident that left double All-Ireland winner Joe McMahon with a broken jaw in a league game with his club Omagh St Enda’s on Sunday afternoon.

McMahon sustained the injury midway through the first-half of the game in Moortown in an incident that was not seen by officials.

McMahon underwent surgery in Altnagelvin Hospital in Derry on Sunday evening where it was confirmed that he had broken his jaw in two places and a number of his teeth were knocked out.

Tyrone county board chairman Ciarán McLaughlin condemned the incident and promised they will act swiftly once the referee’s report has been submitted.

“It was a shocking incident. The fact that he is an inter-county player has obviously brought a lot of attention to it. “But an incident like that shouldn’t be happening full stop on our playing fields no matter who the player is.

“We need to contain occurrences like this. Everyone goes out to play football and wants to be able to get up for work the next morning. But we’ll be waiting for the referee’s report before going any further. Normally that arrives within 72 hours of the game and the standard procedure will be to take it from there.

“The CCC of the Tyrone county board will start investigating once the referee’s report is received.”

Omagh triumphed in the game by a 1-13 to 0-10 margin but the result was overshadowed by the injury sustained by McMahon. The Tyrone star is expected to be out for three months.