McCormack and Powderly not involved as O'Neill confirms Kildare championship panel

The Kildare management team have finalised their senior football panel ahead of this year's Leinster and All-Ireland Senior Football Championships.

The 33-man panel features three players from current county champions, Moorefield, with James Murray, Eanna O'Connor and Mark Dempsey all joining the squad before the final round of the league after their club's defeat in the All-Ireland semi-final to Corofin.

There is a blow however as Ben McCormack and Eoin Powderly have left the setup due to commitments in their personal lives at this time, and neither will be an option in the Leinster Championship this year.

The loss of McCormack will be a particular blow after he looked promising at stages in the National League, while he has also started this year's Kildare Senior Football League in scintillating style for Sarsfields. His absence from the panel has been mooted for some weeks, but manager Cian O'Neill was hoping that an agreement could be met between all parties that would see him able to commit.

The 22-year-old has just commenced the final block release of his electrician’s apprenticeship in Sligo and his 9-6pm college schedule prevents him from travelling back for training during the week. With the county players released back to their clubs for the 6 consecutive weekends from March 30 May 6, this also prevents him from training with the squad at the weekend.

Eoin Powderly has also stepped away from the Senior Squad citing work commitments as the reason. Having recently qualified as a solicitor, Powderly has struggled to combine the challenging workload of his new job with his training commitments.

Kildare SFC panel