Life in Dublin blue leaves room for little else

January may be the time of year when young and ambitious unknowns bust a gut to break onto inter-county panels, but Dublin’s hurlers and footballers have gone about their business recently without key players who decided instead to walk away from it all.

Jim Gavin’s footballers, who relinquished their grip on the O’Byrne Cup with Sunday’s semi-final loss to Longford, will defend their league, Leinster and All-Ireland titles without the input of All-Star full-back Rory O’Carroll who has left for New Zealand.

Ger Cunningham, who opted to drop Alan Nolan and Simon Lambert from his senior hurling panel, has had to contend with the news 2013 All-Star attacker Danny Sutcliffe was stepping aside in order to concentrate on his studies.