Essendon General Manager of Football Josh Mahoney has provided an updates on a number of key players, including Michael Hurley and Anthony McDonald-Tipungwuti.
Hurley, who has been battling an ongoing hip problem for the past two years, is back running and ahead of schedule whilst McDonald-Tipungwuti returned to the club having been granted a leave of absence two weeks ago due to “personal matters”.
Several key players sat out of Wednesday’s intra-club match including young star Harry Jones and new recruit Jake Kelly.
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Michael Hurley
“He’s probably ahead of schedule where we first thought he’d be, he’s doing some big running loads,” Mahoney said on SEN’s Wayne’s World.
“He’s a great person to have around the club and to see him out on the track is great and it’s good to see him out there and we look forward to him joining training at some point.”
Anthony McDonald-Tipungwuti
“He’s good, he was actually at the club today.
“It was documented that we gave him a period away from the club and he came back this morning and joined in training with the guys that didn’t play and he’s in good spirits.
“We’re really happy to have him back and we look forward to supporting him through this next little period and hopefully getting him back to playing the footy we know he can play at AFL level.”
Jake Kelly
“Just a little side strain and we decided to not play him today, he’ll most likely play next week.”
Kyle Langford
“He had a shoulder knock a couple of weeks ago and like (Jake Kelly) we didn’t want to risk it and hopefully he’ll be available next week.”
Harry Jones
“He’s just been building up his preseason, he had a few little interruptions along the way and he may play next if not the week after but he’s in full training now so some good signs for Harry.”
Zach Reid
“He’s just building off a foot injury but he’s not training yet, he’s doing a lot of running and building up his running load, he’s progressing really well.”