TYRONE suffered a blow last night with the news that playmaker Mark Bradley has suffered a setback in his recovery from an ankle injury and will miss Saturday’s All-Ireland SFC Qualifier against Carlow at Netwatch Cullen Park.
Bradley limped off early in the Ulster Championship quarter-final defeat to Monaghan last month, and missed the Qualifier win over Meath, but had been expected to return to action this weekend.
Top scorer Lee Brennan will also be absent from the Tyrone attack, not fully recovered from a hamstring injury that he aggravated against Monaghan
Manager Mickey Harte revealed that Bradley has had difficulties in getting back to full training.
“He’s has a bit of a setback and he won’t be ready for this weekend,” he said.
“We hope that it will improve after this, but it has been more of a struggle than we thought at first, unfortunately he won’t be ready, not Lee won’t either.”
But Tyrone will welcome back Peter Harte, who returns after suspension, while corner-back Cathal McCarron, who missed the extra-time win over Meath at Pairc Tailteann with a chest infection, is set to return to the defence and add vital experience.
A weakened Tyrone side just scraped through in a thrilling clash with the Royals, but Harte was encouraged by the impact made by a number of players who seized their opportunity in a difficult situation, including Harry Loughran, who marked his Championship debut with a goal, while Cathal McShane showed a nerve of steel in scoring a stoppage time point to send the tie to extra-time.
“A lot of things happen on the day that are all good on the day when you win. We could have lost the game just as easily, and then all those things would have been of no value to us,” said Harte.
“We have to make sure that we make the new experiences that some of those boys had on that day work to our advantage.
“We need to bring that experience back to our next game, because in the Qualifiers, there’s always going to be days like that, when you’re living on the edge, and you have to be able to get through that edge.
“And that is the one good thing out of the Meath game, that we were in a very difficult place and a number of players stood up and were counted.”
