Door remains open for Conor Loftus to return to Mayo team

MAYO assistant manager Stephen Rochford has said that ‘the door will remain open’ for Conor Loftus to return to the Mayo senior team.

In an interview with The Mayo News, Rochford said that the Mayo management team are keeping ‘good contact’ with Loftus, who has not featured for the Mayo seniors since their All-Ireland preliminary quarter-final exit to Derry last summer.

Loftus lost his fiancée, Róisín Cryan, in tragic circumstances prior to scoring the winning goal for Crossmolina in the All-Ireland intermediate club championship final. He has scored 5-73 for the Mayo seniors in 88 appearances since 2016 and has won Minor and U-21 All-Ireland titles with his county. 

“I think everybody is fully aware of the tragic events that has happened there. We’ve been giving Conor that space, we are keeping good contact with him,” said Rochford. “We are probably going to see where things are in the near future and see if he’ll return to play with Crossmolina and whatnot.”

READ: How Crossmolina conquered Ireland

Rochford added that Loftus would ‘not be involved in the near future, but that door will always remain open’ for him.

“I think from a point of view, we will continue to offer Conor all the necessary support that he needs and wants. That can be within the environment or outside.”

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INJURY LIST

ROCHFORD also confirmed that Paddy Durcan and Tommy Conroy were ‘very close’ to recovering from injury. The duo were not part of the match-day panel for Mayo’s Division 1 league final defeat to Kerry but took part in training last Wednesday.

“Paddy is just probably slightly ahead of Tommy. I’m not sure whether the Sligo game will come too early or not; certainly [Durcan] hasn’t been ruled out of that. It will come too early for Tommy, certainly,” said Rochford.

“It’s a situation of the nature of their injuries has required us to make sure we are not rushing in one week only for it to fall back and kick them out for a three- or four-week period. An injury now…rules you out of the Connacht championship. We certainly would be talking out of both sides of our mouth about the calendar being one way and being reckless with a player. We certainly wouldn’t have that.”

Mayo goalkeeper Colm Reape has also been sidelined after colliding with Kerry’s David Clifford during the league final. The Knockmore player was replaced by Mayo senior debutant Adrian Phillips from Ballyhaunis.

Speaking after the game, Mayo manager Kevin McStay said that Reape was ‘taken out’ of the game.

“There was some very judicious tackling made on turnover ball, we would argue,” said McStay.

“David’s one on our keeper, being one of them as he’s breaking out, he’s just taken out of the game. That’s as cynical as you can get, in my view. But that’s tipping at straws at that stage. The tackle count was pretty big.”