By Paddy Hunter

TYRONE captain Matthew Donnelly is expected to return to competitive football before the start of this year’s club championship, Trillick manager Nigel Seaney has confirmed.

Donnelly, a talisman for his club side last year as they secured the O’Neill Cup, sustained a nasty injury in the Ulster Club Championship last November when one of the tendons on his hamstring became detached.

Now, nine months on and following surgery, Donnelly has made excellent strides in his recovery, so much so that Seaney believes that he could be back in the red jersey very soon.

“He hopefully will be back for the championship,” Seaney confirmed. “Mattie has been doing bits and pieces but you don’t know until he’s out on the grass with all the twisting and turning.

“We would be confident he will play some part and that would be a great boost, he has done a lot of work himself too.”

The new look league opens this Sunday when most teams will be using their initial four matches for championship preparations.

Reigning senior champions Trillick are no different and Seaney has been busy preparing his players for their opening game away to Clonoe.

For Seaney, the championship still remains the number one target but he admits that it will be a very level playing field this season.

“Tyrone’s championship is competitive anyway, it always is, but on the back of this condensed season we will all be very much starting equal,” he said.

“All aspects of it, a good score, a bad call, experience and injuries, they all play a part when you play in the championship. But this year I feel will be very unpredictable.”

The much-reduced league programme sees Trillick in a group alongside championship opponents Galbally, neighbours Dromore, Donaghmore, Omagh, Derrylaughan, Coalisland and Clonoe. Seaney admitted this would be a strange year.

“Fair play to the fixture-makers, we will have football after all. We all get started together in the league, we will use it to get the players ready without pressure but I don’t know what to expect this year, none of us do.”

Seaney’s side haven’t played challenge games. The issue over the Stormont Government’s move on not allowing local games prompted the management to work on their own players’ fitness and the manager felt that had been important as he took his charges without a normal pre-season.

“No, there was no pre-season. We had players itching to get started but the main thing was that everyone was healthy and well in the community, thankfully that remains the case.

“I suppose we have to be realistic. We must be measured; you can’t rush into things that could risk injury. It is an opportunity to play, of course, one that may not have come but overall there’s that level of uncertainty for all the teams.”

Seaney is happy that there will be no relegation this season.

“Common sense has prevailed over no relegation. There isn’t the full 15 games, all the teams could be missing players. As I said there’s been no real pre-season, you couldn’t set out your plans as normal, it just wasn’t right.

“I have to say these few games will give us the chance to fine-tune, we will monitor all aspects of these games.

“You want to build a bit of momentum and get a degree of confidence ahead of the Galbally game.”

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