It was back at the end of March, early in our National League match against Kildare at Páirc Seán MacDiarmada, that Brendan Harrison suffered what looked then to be a serious injury.
Although no confirmation of the Aghamore clubman’s situation has been forthcoming from Mayo GAA, in this week’s Mayo News Mike Finnerty has a piece (here) stating that it has now been confirmed that it’s a cruciate injury. Brendan has already undergone the necessary surgery to his left knee and he has now embarked on the long road to recovery.
The 2016 All-Star has had a luckless spell on this front in recent years. He picked up a bad knee injury in 2020 and only returned to the fray following that at the start of this year. To get sidelined again with such a serious problem is worse than cruel.
It also highlights, once again, the off-the-charts run we’ve had with bad injuries in recent years. Colm Boyle, Jason Doherty (twice) and Tommy Conroy have all been felled by cruciate injuries since 2019 and, of course, Tom Parsons suffered an even more serious knee injury back in 2018. In addition, Cillian O’Connor missed a full year with a ruptured Achilles tendon, after which he’s only now back in action.
Brendan has now, sadly, been added to the list of Mayo players sidelined for a significant period due to serious injury. As with all the other players who have had to go down this road, all we can do is wish him all the best for a full and speedy recovery. More widely, we can but hope that this dreadful run of serious injuries within the panel will finally come to an end at some point soon.
Horrible news…gutted for the lad.
He will be missed, but that been selfish as mayo supporter. Hope he get back, from injury soon rather than later. Best wishes, to him.
I think we all feared the worst when we saw it happen. Very tough on Harry but hopefully he will make a full recovery.
My preference for next game would be Tyrone or Armagh away. This would be a real test for Horan to see if he has learned anything after all he talks about “learnings” when we lose. Is he a one trick pony at the end of the day? It is extremely difficult to watch our current methodology even when we usef to win. How do you develop forwards when the ball is not going in to them quickly enough to beat the blanket. I think the reaction of the crowd at the Galway game speaks volumes. We were hoping to see something different but soo realisef. It was a movie we had seen many times before but with a few different actors. Time to trar up the script and get a new director.
Bad injuries just keep coming. Very sorry for Harry, very tough.
Gutted for Brendan, whatever about football, he is one of very few County footballers in the construction trade for a living. Im sure that type of injury ( like his other injuries) will impede him with a physically demanding job. These lads go through so much to play elite sport with such little reward, you can only but admire them.
In Mayo terms he’s a massive loss, he was working himself back to full fitness and match sharpness. Any word on Oisin?
Gutting news for Brendan, must take a massive toll when you start racking up multiple horrible injuries.
Re next game – I want the softest opponents we can manage. Get the need to see where management are at tactically, but I’d want that test to come when we’re as close to a full deck of players we can get. Just because lads are back doesn’t mean they’ll be 100% match fit. Just because they get match fitness back doesn’t mean they’ll automatically rediscover form. A team without Harrison and Conroy for the rest of the season is plenty enough of a set back.
Feel bad for the young man. Get well soon.
This is ridiculous lack of communication and updates from Mayo Gaa. Mayo fans are the best in the sport so we dont deserve this type of treatment. I’ve followed Mayo Gaa coverage very closely for years and I havent seen anything too critical to warrant this slience, if anything media and fans are too easy on them. For any 1 fan who dares to question anything there seems to be 10 fans to defend them.
Tough on Brendan, he has so many injuries. Seems its plough on re hurling match with a post on social media about tickets, time, etc. Oh yea and a fundraising golf outing. That is all us mere fans are getting by way of communication obviously!
That’s terrible news, best of luck to Brendan in his recovery.
What is it about the amount of long-term layoffs we have gotten in the last five years or so? The Dubs were blessed in comparison, can’t ever remember the likes of Cluxton, Fenton, Rock, Kilkenny etc. picking up anything like this during their careers (although Jack McCaffrey did get a bad one in 2017, to be fair).
It Means Nothing to Me – Ciaran Kilkenny was out for a year with a cruciate injury. It was a good while ago and he wasn’t as key to them then as he later became but he did miss the best part of one season all the same.
So sorry to hear about Brendan’s latest awful injury. Someone above stated he works in construction and as someone that does likewise, I know how difficult it is. I imagine he hasn’t worked properly for the last two years and unlikely to for the next one.
If ever there was a need for a fundraiser, it’s surely for him. I would gladly contribute if the situation arose.
Injuries will kill us this year. Cillian looked flat footed against Galway. Match fitness is needed, games against second tier teams necessary
Jr, i thought Cillian did remarkably well against Galway, for a man that was out for a year. He was never a pacey player, even when he came into the team. But your also spot on, he and others need games asap. The kinder the draw the better in our first game, as these lads are all about momemtum. Get through the first game and they’ll fear no one.
Seems lots of people around the Country are writing off Tyrone, i for one wouldn’t bet against them. They have a little break now no more than ourselves,, and Dooher/Logan will be in seige mentality mode again….they’ll be dangerous.
I honestly think we’d be better off this year going out in the next round and give our injuries time to heal up before the start of next years league. We will probably have a new manager at the wheel next year, i think the loss of two all Irelands in quick sucsession has affected the players and the manager more than we thought. Sometimes you just need a break from football for while and do something else and come back fresh. Wishing Brendan a speedy recovery he has been a brillant servant for us
Horrible injury.For some reason it’s becoming an injury that’s happening more and more Takes the guts of a year to recover and get match fit etc and it’s a long and lonely injury as you have to do most of rehab on your own. Best wishes to Brendan a great player for us. It’s shocking when you look at the above list of Mayo lads who have got this injury in recent years
Best of luck to Brendan in his recovery.
Its an injury that was all too common 20 years ago. At that time it was often a career finishing injury. Thankfully that day is gone and most come back from it but I dont envy anyone going through the rehab. It seemed to disappear for a few years but is coming more common again
I seen Aghamore put up a social media post when he had the operation – good on them thinking of their own. Its a pity Mayo GAA didnt do likewise. Similar last year with Eoghan McLaughlin with Westport confirming his injury.
Best of luck to Brendan and with his recovery. I hope he gets back to full mobility, and no traces of any injury when his rehab is complete.
Wish brEndan well in recovery, good servant and good luck to him.
But seriously, the narrative on injuries is tiresome,
Yes we have a few, but if we think this is the reason for All our failures then we’re not be honest to ourselves.
Best wishes for a full and fast recovery to Brendan, and indeed all of other injured players!
Terrible luck for Harry (I actually thought this news was released before as i thought it was common knowledge shortly after the kildare game he had done his acl)
I see him regularly about in his van,this will effect his work and that makes it twice as hard.He was emotional when he emerged on crutches up in Leitrim, I really feel for him and hopefully he can make it back.
On a brighter note I was chatting to a player on the injury comeback trail himself who said he’ll be back in 2 weeks and more importantly morale has never been as good in the squad and they’re raring to go.
Never write these lads off.
Best of luck to Harry and all the injured players. Let’s hope the CB are looking after these players! I presume that the money made from the MayoGAA lotto goes to help pay for medical bills etc.
This is why I support it on a weekly basis!
Bigi linn
Mhuigeo Abu!
FW, could you give us more clues as to who this player was? Is he from North Mayo?
Tá súil agam go bhfaightear na himeoirí gorthaithe cúiteamh lena chois sin, Oileán Acla. Sa chaite, chulathas an-chuid drochscéalta maidir le easpa cúraim sa Cumann Luthchleas Gael. Cuirtear sár-iarracht sá lá atá inniú ann i measc na n-imreoirí agus dar liom, ní bheadh aon imreoir gaelach as póca tar éis gortú.
D’fhulaing Brendan go huafásach le na gorthaithe sna blianta beaga anuas. Is mór an trua é, beimis foireann i bhfad níos fearr le Harry ar imeall na cearnóige, i mo bharúilse. Bheadh sé ina “Man Marker” níos gaire ná P. O’Hora, dar liom, agus géillóimis níos lú cúl mar gheall ar sin.
Easy up there, Deel River. The spreading and solicitation of unconfirmed rumours about named players is not encouraged here.
It means nothing to me, what’s the point? Most only have the coupla focal!
@RP McMurphy: Well I was responding to something that Oileán Acla wrote (he seems to be a Gaeilgeoir). But for those who aren’t fluent, there’s always Google Translate (if one can be arsed translating my ramblings!).
I must say that learning Irish was one of the great joys of my life. Hope Willie Joe doesn’t mind the odd post as Gaeilge.
RP Mcmurphy, nothing stopping you from learning more than the cupla focal.
Duolingo is great! Not just for Irish, but French, German, Spanish or whatever else takes your fancy.
I find it hard to understand why so many seem hostile to Irish. I spent several years in England as a kid, rocked up back to Co.Mayo at 11 and couldn’t believe that I knew more of it than many school mates who had eight years of schooling in it. Other than the GAA and Irish, what really marks us out culturally from the British these days?
Anyway, I digress.
Can’t understand the big taboo and secrecy around this news. It’s unfathomable. I can’t see any positives for the Mayo county team in keeping something like this under wraps.
Embarrassing that Aghamore Gaa club effectively announced it on social media while the county senior side said nothing.
I mean, would it not show a bit of respect for an important servant for Mayo the last 7 or 8 years, to just inform the fans of his injury a week or two after it happened and wish him well in rehab?
We as supporters would provide him with plenty of well wishes and then move on and stop repeatedly bringing it up at press conferences, post game interviews etc.
it’s just another example of what the current setup thinks of the fans and the Mayo Gaa public. They are only interested in engaging with supporters when shaking them down for more money and that’s it.
Amateur stuff and as a diehard fan I’m getting well sick of it now.