Time for others to take on more in wake of Canning’s injury blow

IT hasn’t taken long for the local prophets of doom to come out of the trenches in the wake of Joe Canning’s serious groin injury which has ruled him out of the upcoming Leinster hurling championship. A possible four-month lay-off faces the 2017 Player of the Year after being stretchered off in the recent National League semi-final against Waterford.

It was immediately clear that the Portumna clubman was in serious trouble after being caught off balance by a hefty Kevin Moran shoulder charge, but in less than 48 hours we had unofficial updates which began on Twitter suggesting that the extent of Canning’s troubles was a only a ‘dead leg’ and that he might be even be fit for the opening round of the local championship which starts this weekend.

One of the big problems with social media is that we have an insane number of users who want to tell you today what’s going to happen tomorrow. The obsession with being first out of the traps means a lot of these musings portrayed as fact are poorly researched and are just second-hand observations. In relation to Canning, it raised false hope among supporters and probably some of his team-mates that the injury wasn’t nearly as serious as first feared.

In fairness to team manager Micheál Donoghue, when I contacted him about Canning’s situation last Wednesday morning, he was completely up front about the player’s injury. Had any other journalist or media person bothered to make that same call? Even some of the daily newspapers ran with the story that Canning only faced a short spell on the sidelines.

Outside the dressing rooms at Nowlan Park last Sunday week, Donoghue immediately reported that Galway’s star player has suffered a groin injury, ensuring he and the rest of the team management must have suffered some level of frustration with the ‘news’ bulletins that suggested Canning would be fully recovered in little more than a fortnight.

For more, read this week’s Connacht Tribune.

Get the Connacht Tribune Live app The Connacht Tribune Live app is the home of everything that is happening in Galway City and county. It’s completely FREE and features all the latest news, sport and information on what’s on in your area. Click HERE to download it for iPhone and iPad from Apple’s App Store, or HERE to get the Android Version from Google Play.