Mayo missing trio for league openers

MAYO boss James Horan may be without three players for the start of the Allianz Football League.

Two of his most experienced defenders, Trevor Mortimer and Tom Cunniffe, are both out of the country, while goalkeeper Robbie Hennelly picked up an injury playing for DCU in the O’Byrne Cup last weekend. The trio are unlikely to feature in Mayo’s opening games against Laois and All-Ireland champions Dublin on February 4 and 11.

Mortimer is in Africa on work-related business while Cunniffe is understood to be in the USA.

“Trevor Mortimer is away at the moment so we’ll be talking to him,” explained James Horan last weekend. “He’ll be available probably from February onwards. He’s working away on his own. Tom Cunniffe isn’t with us at the moment. He may be back for the league, he’s going to be out of the country for a while, so we’ll just have to keep all our options open.”

Hennelly will be out for up to four weeks after chipping a bone in his elbow on Sunday.

Horan also confirmed the door remains open for midfielder, Ronan McGarrity, to return to the inter-county stage. The Ballina Stephenites midfielder was not included in the group of Mayo players that were working on individual training programmes before Christmas, and is not currently training with Mayo.

“Ronan is working on his fitness. I’ll be talking to him towards the end of January to see how he’s doing. There’s no set or finalised panel yet. One thing I’ve learned is to keep all our options open, especially when you’ve guys at inter-county level so dedicated and can return from injury quickly.”