Sean Og is back, Jerry O'Connor retired

The Cork Senior Hurling training panel for the coming season has been announced and will be reviewed on an on-going basis.

To those outgoing players who aren't included in the panel at the moment, the management would like to pay tribute to the fantastic service they have given to the Cork jersey over the last few years.

Jerry O'Connor is retiring from Inter-county hurling and Kieran Murphy is not available due to work commitments at present outside of the Cork area.

The full training panel is as follows:

Donal Og Cusack (Cloyne)
Martin Coleman (Ballinhassig)
Anthony Nash (Kanturk)
Christopher Joyce (Na Piarsaigh)
Stephen McDonnell (Glen Rovers)
Conor O'Sullivan (Sarsfields)
Eoin Cadogan (Douglas)
Ross Cashman (Kilbrittain)
Brian Murphy (Bride Rovers)
Shane O'Neill (Bishopstown)
John Gardiner (Na Piarsaigh)
Sean Og Ó hAilpín (Na Piarsaigh)
William Egan (Kilbrin)
Jamie Nagle (Midleton)
Patrick O'Mahony (Midleton)
Damien Cahalane (St. Finbarr's)
Lorcan McLoughlin (Kanturk)
Pa Cronin (Bishopstown)
Bill Cooper (Youghal)
Daniel Kearney (Sarsfields)
Tom Kenny (Grenagh)
Cathal Naughton (Newtownshandrum)
Ben O'Connor (Newtownshandrum)
Michael O'Sullivan (Tracton)
Eoin Dillon (Milford)
Niall McCarthy (Carrigtwohill)
Cian McCarthy (Sarsfields)
Conor Lehane (Midleton)
Luke O'Farrell (Midleton)
Jamie Coughlan (Newtownshandrum)
Patrick Horgan (Glen Rovers)
Paudie O'Sullivan (Cloyne)

With the leagues reduced in size, there won't be as much room for experimenting as there was last year - and a good thing, too: Denis Walsh just didn't know where to stop. However he’s already done a lot of the spade work for JBM and given many young players a taste of inter-county. If they can go the full length of the Waterford Crystal, it might give him a little bit of room for manoeuvre, but come the league, he’ll have to try and sort his best team out fast and get them used to winning. All tough matches, but that’s the best way for it to be. At the tail end of the league, Cork have a little more time than they had last year, since they won’t play their first match until June. If it’s Tipp, it will be in Pairc UiChaoimh.

So has Sean Og been called back for playing reasons or political reasons? I ask this honestly as i know nothing of the Cork club scene and am wondering os his club form worthy of a call up to the county side?

I'd like to wish Jerry O'Connor all the best in his intercounty retirement, there was a two year period when i thought he was simply awesome, i loved watching him play then as he was a wizard with the hurl!

bald eagle wrote:So has Sean Og been called back for playing reasons or political reasons? I ask this honestly as i know nothing of the Cork club scene and am wondering os his club form worthy of a call up to the county side?

I'd like to wish Jerry O'Connor all the best in his intercounty retirement, there was a two year period when i thought he was simply awesome, i loved watching him play then as he was a wizard with the hurl!

I would say that it's for his hurling experience. It's not a great surprise, as he was one of the last that anyone (even his enemies) expected to be culled last year. Plenty of other effectively dead wood was retained. I don't think we will ever know the reason he was dropped; only Denis Walsh and possibly O'Hailpin, himself, knows that. Sean Og is the kind of man who doesn't know when to keep his mouth shut - as was seen during the last strike when his every utterance fanned the flames of an already raging inferno - so I can only presume it was something he said that Walsh as manager could not accept.