Dublin are sweating on the fitness of James McCarthy after he hobbled out of yesterday’s Leinster final demolition of Meath.
McCarthy had to be replaced in the 33rd minute of the 1-17 to 0-4 victory - he later left Croke Park on crutches and with ice applied to his left knee.
The six-time All-Ireland winner was absent for much of this year’s Allianz League having undergone keyhole surgery on his knee and also missed a chunk of Dublin’s Championship campaign in 2016 with a medial ligament problem.
As the Championship moves towards the business end, the absence of a frontline player such as McCarthy would be damaging to the champions’ five-in-a-row ambitions.
Dublin manager Jim Gavin gave little away on McCarthy’s wellbeing afterwards, commenting: “We’ll have a look over the next 48 hours. The medical protocols will kick into place. We’ll reassess early next week.”
Gavin also lost Paddy Small to injury just minutes after he was introduced late on though he claimed that defender Jonny Cooper is “close” to making a return, with their next fixture falling on the weekend of July 13/14 in the ‘Super 8s’.
Although Dublin won comfortably in the end yesterday, they didn’t put distance between themselves and Meath until the second half having led by 0-5 to 0-1 at the end of a somewhat bizarre first half.
“It panned out the way we thought it would,” Gavin insisted. “We thought it would be a very close game. The players were really attacking the game.
“There was a lot of turnovers in it, but that was from our pressing on the Meath defence. Thankfully in the second half, it came together a bit more. So we’re happy.”
Dublin now go into a quarter-final group containing Connacht champions Roscommon along with whoever comes through the ties involving Cork and Cavan in the fourth round of the qualifiers.
Gavin added: “Obviously I need to lift it up now and see who we potentially could have and what the sequence will be. But, yeah we've a lot of work to do.
“We'll enjoy tonight and it is a final, it's a Leinster final and we're going to meet the family and friends and reflect on the occasion and next week we'll get ready for the challenge ahead.”
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