Not quite the pied piper but R

FROM Rotuma to Croke Park, Sean Og O hAilpin has been one of the most unique players ever to grace a GAA pitch.

JONATHAN COATES looks at the Cork stalwart's take on the game and how hurling figures view him.

IN HIS OWN WORDS

THE EXTRA ELEMENT -- EMILIE O hAILpiN

'Mum would go in goal. She's no Brendan Cummins but she'd get something to it. Too many goals and it's no dinner. So we'd go for points. There's no flaking like what we did to each other out there'

On childhood games with brothers Aisake, Teu and Setanta.

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BOSS, I CAN'T PLAY TODAY

'My knee was blown out of position and it shot up my thigh. It was the least of my worries, there was a full load in that car. The guy came over, wedged my door open and asked was I okay and said, "ah, you're not Sean Og from Cork are you? Don't you have a match?" I says, "not by looking at me leg". They helped me over to the ditch, he had a right to kick the **** out of me, but he helped'

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After causing a car crash in 2001, he is relieved that no one else was hurt.

DONAL OG'S OUR NELSON MANDELA

'Donal Og not involved in the Cork set-up is like Nelson Mandela not being in South Africa'

Sean Og on the importance of '' keeper Cusack to the Rebel County.

SUN SETS ON THE AUSSIE DREAM

'I was setting myself up for life in Sydney where there was a sunny climate, you'd go to the Customized NFL Jersey beach, go to school in shorts and and live on Vegemite and lamington buns. I never cried so much as I did at Sydney airport and I haven't cried as much since. I still feel angry in ways for leaving'

On leaving Sydney, where he lived before moving to Cork aged 11.

A BLUSH WITH FAME

'When you take away the profile I have, I am a shy person by nature. So I'm not comfortable with this title. It's a good slagging point amongst my team-mates in the dressing room -- they go to town on me.'

Embarrassed at being voted 'Ireland's sexiest GAA player'.

KILKENNY: A PERFECT STORM

'You dream of an ideal performance but it never happens. You dream of winning every ball and every contest when you are in a final but it never turns out like that. Except last week for Kilkenny'

Looking back at Kilkenny's masterful destruction of Waterford in the 2008 All-Ireland final.

TAKING FIGHT TO FRANK

'We don't say, "Yes Frank, three bags full Frank". Since we stood up to the county board in 2002, this is payback time'

Standing up to secretary Frank Murphy and the county board during the Gerald McCarthy dispute.'

I'M NOT A WRITE-OFF

'A lot of people have me written off. D&G jacket They say I'm too old. My pace is gone. But if anyone knows my history, I've been written off since I was a kid, when I got "what the hell is this half-Fijian doing playing hurling?" I've been used to it for the last 20 years'

The Cork legend confronts his hurling mortality in May.

THE EYES OF OTHERS