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McElduff out to defend his crown

The 2014 Irish One Wall Nationals was arguably the greatest renewal to date, with two first-time finalists in the Men’s Open, thrilling matches all the way through and, to top it off, a new winner ascending to the throne.

Heavy, though, is the crown. Twelve months later, no 1 seed and defending champion Conor McElduff has, by his own admission, “been through the wars” with injury in recent weeks.

The 21-year-old Brackey man warmed up for the tournament with an emphatic win at the Mallow event last month, seeing off CJ Fitzpatrick, Johnny Woods, Ciaran Malone and Barry Devlin en route to an impressive 15-5, 15-8 final win over local hotshot Killian Carroll.

However, he was forced to withdraw from the star-studded Tyrone league recently due to illness and his bad luck continued when he sustained a broken finger in unusual circumstances.

“I have been training a right bit but I had to pull out of the Tyrone League because I got gastritis,” ‘Duff’ told GAAHandball.ie.

“Then I broke my finger last Friday. I’m going through the wars at the minute.”

The laid back Tyrone man, the current All-Ireland 40x20 Junior Singles champion, smiles as he relates the tale of how he got injured.

“It’s a bit of an embarrassing story!” he said.

“ I was going for a jog and I tipped over a dog, he came in from behind me and took the feet from under me. Fierce bad luck! It’s the second finger on my right hand, I can’t bend it at the minute but I’ll have it taped up at the weekend. I grazed my forearm as well.”

McElduff will be fancied to see off Galway’s ambidextrous Peter Davoren to set up a tough quarter-final against the winner of his clubmate Gabhainn McCrystal and Limerick’s in-form Paudi Quish.

“That one should be close enough, both of the lads are playing well,” he said. The injury has arrived at the worst possible team for the smooth Breacach man, who had been training hard with an eye on next month’s World Championships in Calgary.

“I was intending on gong to the Worlds, I don’t know what will happen with this finger. I had been training fair hard. I have a One Wall court at the house, I practise in it most days, it’s an indoor court in a big shed. Some of the lads come over, Sean Kerr, Johnny Woods, Pol Clarke, all those boys, so it’s handy for training for this.”

McElduff is one of the few serious handballers who play with a smile at all times. Asked if he will feel any pressure going in as top seed this weekend, he grinned: “No, no, no pressure at all! I’ll just play my game.”

The plan for the champ is to arrive early on Thursday evening to get a feel for the courts. A lover of the One Wall code (“it’s the most fun anyway”), Conor is looking forward to the challenge.

“I’ll get down there Thursday night, I wouldn’t mind going down and hitting around d in the courts that night and then relaxing and playing as hard as I can on Friday and hopefully into the weekend,” he said.