Donnellan in fitness race for semi-final after chipping bone

Galway hurling manager Anthony Cunningham is confident key attacker Cyril Donnellan will be fit for the All-Ireland semi-final on August 12 despite chipping a bone in his arm.

Donnellan, outstanding in the victories over Offaly and Kilkenny, suffered the injury in a training match.

The Padraig Pearses clubman is restricted in training but Cunningham is confident he will recover in plenty of time.

“He should be fine. It’s restricting his hurling at the moment but that should clear up and we expect to have him for the semi-final,” said Cunningham.

“He’s having a great year and it would be terrible to lose him, but we believe Cyril will be fine for the semi-final,” said Cunningham.

It will be Galway’s first All-Ireland semi-final appearance since they defeated Kilkenny in a thriller in 2005.

Meanwhile Sligo centre-forward Pat Hughes is in a race against time to be fit for their All-Ireland SFC qualifier against Kildare on Saturday.

Hughes, who has been a revelation for Sligo this year, missed the Connacht final loss to Mayo with a hamstring injury which has not cleared up.

But manager Kevin Walsh says he will give Hughes every chance to prove his fitness ahead of their qualifier clash with Kildare at Dr Hyde Park on Saturday.

“Pat was an awful loss for us in the Connacht final, we’ll have to see how he is at training over the next few days, but it is going to be touch and go whether he makes it back,” said Walsh.

“He has been one of our main players all year: he is strong in the air and on the ground and we really missed him against Mayo.”

While the double All-Ireland winner is conscious of the difficult task facing his side, he was pleased to see Limerick putting it up to Kildare last weekend when Kieran McGeeney’s men needed extra-time to get past Maurice Horan’s side.

“Limerick gave them a good fright last weekend and they played pretty well. But Kildare are a tough nut to crack, and I don’t think this bunch of players have been beaten in the qualifiers yet.

“We’ll soon see how our lads have recovered from losing the Connacht final. We won’t really know how they are fixed until we hit the field, but it is always good to see one of the bigger teams coming along next to get your heads up for it again.”