Peter Kelly ruled out for Kildare

Kildare's main injury absentee ahead of their Leinster Senior Football Championship semi-final against Meath on Sunday is defender Peter Kelly.

The Two Mile House clubman, an All Star in 2010, has been ruled out after suffering a tear in his hamstring at Kildare training over the weekend.

It's the latest injury for Kelly in a year that has been already been significantly disrupted. The latest injury comes after Kelly had just battled his way back to fitness after a serious knee injury.

That problem kept him out of Two Mile House's march to the All-Ireland Junior Club Championship title in the early months of this year , while he also missed Kildare's entire Allianz Football League campaign in Division I, in which they suffered relegation.

Kelly originally suffered a cruciate ligament injury to his right knee in 2011, and was scheduled to undergo a routine cartilage operation on the same knee late last year. However, there were unexpected complications, and Kelly only returned to full training in recent weeks.

The latest injury is therefore a particularly frustrating blow for the gifted defender, given that he already missed Kildare's championship opener - the comfortable 1-22 to 1-7 win over Louth in June.

Aside from Kelly, Kildare manager Jason Ryan will also be without forward Darroch Mulhall for the game, as the Athy player has still not resumed contact work since being sidelined by acute appendicitis ahead of the Louth game.

Meath have a much more punishing injury list, exacerbated by the news on Tuesday that forward Michael Newman is a major doubt to face Kildare after suffering a hamstring injury in training.

Having scored 3-2 in Meath's quarter-final win over Carlow , Newman would be a significant loss for Mick O'Dowd's side, who are already without Eamonn Wallace and Conor Gillespie (both cruciate knee ligament injuries).

Kildare take on Meath at 2pm in Croke Park this Sunday, in a match that will be televised live on RTÉ.