Waterford hurling has lost one of its most recognisable figures, with Austin Gleeson confirming that he has called time on his inter-county career with the county.

Affectionately known as ‘Aussie’, Gleeson made his Waterford senior debut in 2014 after winning an All-Ireland Minor medal with the county in 2013.

A year later, he helped Waterford to National League Division One success before producing a remarkable 2016 campaign.

Gleeson was named an All-Star at centre-forward and also claimed the Young Hurler of the Year and Hurler of the Year awards, becoming only the second player after Kilkenny’s Tony Kelly to win both in the same year.

He went on to help Waterford reach the All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship final in 2017, a campaign remembered in particular for his stunning goal against Kilkenny in the All-Ireland semi-final.

Speaking to WLR following the announcement, Gleeson admitted the reaction to his retirement had been difficult to process.

“It’s a bit mad, everything, just to be honest,” he said.

“I know it’s 10 years ago, all that stuff happened, but it is. It’s been a mad few days.

“I didn’t anticipate it going the way it went. I didn’t anticipate the interviews were going that way either, but I suppose it just happened that way.”

Gleeson’s goal against Kilkenny at Croke Park remains one of the most iconic moments of his career.

Reflecting on it, he admitted there was little planning behind the finish.

“I don’t know. I haven’t dreamed it,” he said.

“I went to catch the ball, and I actually dropped it, and then I would have had a shot for a point. I don’t know, it just kind of opened up a small bit, and I just went. I just kept running.”

The goal has continued to be brought up by supporters in the days since his announcement.

“A lot of people have said, ‘Jesus, I’ll never forget that 2017 goal’. So it’s always a bit mad, to be honest.”

Gleeson also spoke about the difficulty of dealing with the expectations that came with being one of Waterford’s most highly regarded players.

He said the biggest pressure came from himself as he tried to replicate the heights he reached during his outstanding 2016 season.

“I suppose there has been, and the biggest person that put the pressure on me was probably myself,” Gleeson said.

“I hit the highs in 2016, and I was always trying to target getting back to those levels again, but I couldn’t.

“I was trying to get back up to where I got in 2016, but some of the things I suppose that happened and I did in 2016 were just like, I was never going to do again.”

Gleeson admitted that the outside criticism affected him during the earlier part of his career, but said he eventually learned to block out the noise.

“2016, 2017, 2018, I suppose 2019, really, and up until Covid, I probably bought into a lot of that, and it affected me,” he said.

“But the last number of years, I didn’t really listen to the outside noise. It was probably the noise of my own head that probably was my biggest downfall.”

He also reflected on the unique demands placed on inter-county players, who combine their sporting commitments with work and everyday life.

“We get up on Monday morning and go to work,” he said.

“It’s something that I suppose a lot of people just probably take for granted; anyone playing GAA, it’s realistically a volunteer.”

For Gleeson, the opportunity to represent Waterford was something he never took for granted.

He described pulling on the county jersey as an “unbelievable” honour and recalled the atmosphere created by Waterford supporters during some of the county’s biggest days.

“I’ve always been obsessed with hurling since I was a child, like a baby, and to have the opportunity to wear the Waterford jersey was just unbelievable,” he said.

“To put it on for 13 or 14 years, it’s almost half my life that I was doing it. It’s a mad thing to kind of put into perspective.”

He singled out the atmosphere surrounding Waterford’s Munster and All-Ireland campaigns, including the 2017 All-Ireland semi-final against Cork and the county’s success at underage level.

“When Waterford is going well, they are just unbelievable fans,” he said.

“To have the honour to put on a jersey, where there’s 50 or 60,000 people that want to put on a jersey and maybe unfortunately can’t, to be one of those select few that were able to do it, it was unbelievable.”

While his inter-county career is now over, Gleeson is expected to remain involved with Mount Sion at club level.

For more than a decade, he has been a central figure in Waterford hurling, from his emergence as a teenage star to becoming an All-Ireland finalist and one of the county’s most decorated individual players.

Now, after 13 years wearing the blue and white, Austin Gleeson has called time on his Waterford inter-county career.