Gardiner’s exclusion ends final link to great Cork half-back line

Hard on the heels of Seán Óg Ó hAilpín’s decision to retire from inter-county hurling, comes the surprising news that his Na Piarsaigh teammate John Gardiner has been cut from the Cork training panel.

Surprising in that Gardiner, whom many saw as cover for a number of positions on the Cork team, is still only 29.

A commanding and combative defender, Gardiner, after breaking through to the senior starting 15 in 2002, made the right-half-back position his own and went on to become part of a dominant line that included Ó hAilpín on the other wing and St Finbarr’s stylist Ronan Curran in the centre.