There’s a bit of a difference between the All-Ireland football final and the opening stages of the O’Byrne Cup but Cian O’Sullivan is looking to bridge that exact playing gap in hopefully resuming his inter-county career in early January.
Looking fit and tanned having just returned from Dublin’s team holiday in Thailand, he braved the wind and rain by the Martello tower in Sandymount, to help launch GOAL’s Christmas miles (www.goalglobal.org) which will number over 130 events in this their 34th year.
O’Sullivan defied a hamstring injury to help the Dubs beat Kerry in September and relishes a return to competitive fare. “We are all looking forward to getting back into training and kicking off the year with the O’Byrne Cup.
“That is the enjoyable part. It is going to be a tall order; we set our sights on the O’Byrne Cup, the league and the championship. We had our team holiday there and we will have our medal presentation on Friday, and that really is the last of it.
“We will meet up over the next couple of weeks and set out the stall for New Year. The O’Byrne Cup is coming now on January 3rd, and we have the Blue Stars game on the January 2nd. That’s when it really kicks off again, start playing games again. I think all the lads are looking forward to getting back into the mix and getting training again.
“The hamstring is fully healed at this stage,” he added although he pointed out he hadn’t fully tested it out from a competitive perspective, just doing some training with the club.
“I’m hoping to get a good block of pre-hab in in the first couple of weeks of training. I’ll just see how the leg responds to that and see how the body is feeling.
“I’m just looking forward to getting back training and playing games is what you want to do. So hopefully I’ll be involved for the first couple.”
Impending retirements
He hadn’t heard of any impending retirements within Jim Gavin’s squad, pointing out that they had a pretty clean bill of health with Eoghan O’Gara on course to return from his cruciate knee injury in March or early April.
When asked about the prospect of his Kilmacud Crokes club-mate Paul Mannion rejoining the Dublin squad he ventured: “I hope so. He’s back doing his exams in UCD at the moment. He’s playing with the club, playing very well. He was over in Chicago for the summer and playing ball over there.
“Yeah, it would be great to see him back if he does; he’s an incredible talent. But you know that’s up to the management.”
