The Dunloy ace has been sidelined since last season’s Antrim SHC semi-final while Shane Elliott has sought to allay fitness concerns over Seaan Elliott who was taken off at half-time against St John’s
Dunloy boss Shane Elliott is hopeful that star forward Conal ‘Coby’ Cunning will be fit to play some part in the Antrim SHC semi-final.
The Antrim ace has been sidelined ever seen he suffered a cruciate injury in last season’s semi-final win over Loughgiel.
He talented dual player, he could return to action in the coming weeks with the north Antrim men still in contention for senior honours in both codes.
After beating St John’s at Corrigan Park on Saturday , Dunloy topped Group Two and will face either Loughgiel or Ballycastle in the semi-finals with champions Cushendall awaiting the winners of the west Belfast derby between the Johnnies and Rossa.
When asked if Cunning could return for the semi-finals, Elliot replied: “He’ll not be a million miles away.
That’s the truth. I think, at the minute, we’re taking it week to week. With ‘Coby’ we’re just following medical advice to the letter of the law.
“So, whatever the medics say, we will adhere to. But, week on week, we can see Coby’s now a part of our training. We can see the class that he has.
“We all know that. So, I’ll be surprised if he doesn’t play some part in the Championship before it’s finished.”
Dunloy hit St John’s for 5-23 in his absence with Seaan Elliott scoring 2-6 in the first half before being taken off.
Elliott confirmed his nephew was substituted as a precaution after taking a bang to the head late in the first half, but he should be fit to line out for the footballers in their Antrim SFC quarter-final meeting with St Brigid’s on Saturday.
“Seaan got hit in the head. So, we were taking no chances,” said Elliott.
“He was all right. I don’t think he’s concussed or anything. But he was feeling a wee bit light. But they’ve done the assessments. He’s not concussed. So, we were just taking no chances. Plus, he’ll play the football Championship next week. We took Keelan (Molloy) and Nigel (Elliott) off.
“We were taking no chances with anybody because we’re trying to play in a football Championship next week.
“We have to be fair to the footballers in terms of how we manage the players as well.”
Avoiding the quarter-finals also gives the hurlers an extra fortnight to prepare for a last four tie against one of their north Antrim rivals.
“I wouldn’t have said it before the match, but it’s critical for us. It was absolutely critical for us,” added Elliott.
“And we set out, when we saw the groups out, we saw the way the games were lining up. We knew we need to top the group to give us a bit of a barrier with what’s going on. The footballers are out next week.
So, if we had to play next week, the following week, we would have. But we would rather have avoided it. We wanted a four-week turnaround between today’s game and the semi-finals, so that we can get ourselves really properly prepared.”
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