No room for sentiment for Cork’s blood brothers Dónal Óg Cusack and Diarmuid O’Sullivan

It was as close to kinship as you could get. So precious that those who they should have invited into their inner circle felt left out.

“Before the 2003 first round game against Clare,” remembers Pat Mulcahy, “myself and Wayne (Sherlock) were in the full-back line with Diarmuid and Dónal Óg. I turned around for the national anthem and the two boys were standing for it inside under the crossbar.

“I looked over to Wayne as if to say, ‘Jesus what’s going on here?’ It was my second championship game and I was standing on my own. In fairness, we rectified it for the Munster final and all four of us did it for years but the lads were that tight they forgot about us.”