The inspirational Galway skipper has suffered an injury-marred 13 months, ever since he first suffered ankle damage – ironically against Armagh – in an All-Ireland round-robin clash played at Carrick-on-Shannon in June of last year.
He was originally named to start their recent semi-final against Donegal, only for his place to be filled by Cein D’Arcy at the 11th hour.
Kelly is now restored to the official starting team for Sunday’s showdown, listed at midfield with D’Arcy dropping to the bench. This is the only flagged change from the last day, with Damien Comer and Shane Walsh – two other marquee stars who have endured injury-hit campaigns – once more included in a potent inside line.
Time will tell if the Galway captain is ready to start; even in that eventuality, the likelihood is that he would switch to half-forward with John Maher reprising the midfield role he has excelled in of late.
Kelly has been in and out of the team all year, through a mixture of ankle and hamstring issues. He started their epic quarter-final win against Dublin but only lasted 22 minutes before hobbling off, to be replaced by D’Arcy.
Speaking at Galway’s All-Ireland press briefing last week, after the Moycullen man returned to training, Joyce admitted: “He probably wasn’t fully ready the last day (against Donegal) so we’re hoping to get another two weeks into him and we’ll check him out. Hopefully he’ll be available for some sort of time anyway.”
GALWAY (SFC v Armagh) – C Gleeson; J McGrath, S Fitzgerald, J Glynn; D McHugh, L Silke, S Mulkerrin; P Conroy, S Kelly; M Tierney, J Maher, C McDaid; R Finnerty, D Comer, S Walsh. Subs: C Flaherty, J Daly, E Kelly, D O’Flaherty, K Molloy, C Sweeney, C D’Arcy, J Heaney, L Ó Conghaile, T Culhane, N Daly.