Hurling All-Ireland club semi-finals: The AIB club championship returns from its winter hiatus this Sunday, featuring the original GAA underdogs - the Ulster club hurling champions.

Once they reach the semi-final stage they're rarely expected to win, and rarely do, which more or less describes the meeting of Ballygalget and Newtownshandrum next Sunday.

Ballygalget won the Ulster title in October, but weren't even expected to do that. The Down champions had last triumphed in 1999, and yet managed to beat the fancied Cushendall of Antrim, thus progressing to Sunday's All-Ireland semi-final. They can only hope that trend continues when they play the All-Ireland champions of two years ago and arguably the most feared club side in the country.

"We know how hard it's going to be to beat Newtownshandrum," says Liam Clarke, the Ballygalget corner back and captain. "On paper they're a lot better than we are, but with a bit of luck, of course, we believe it can happen.

"It's actually more mental now than physical. I think we're as fit as any team, but on the day it's all in the head. If you go down thinking you'll be beaten then you'll definitely be beaten. But being underdogs is something we're used to."

Ballygalget head to Portlaoise with uneasy memories of their last semi-final appearances. In 1999 they played Rathnure of Wexford and lost by 14 points, and their only other appearance before that was in 1976, when they lost to James Stephens of Kilkenny by 17 points.

It doesn't help they're coming from such a restricted hurling country. Ballygalget, in fact, play in the Antrim hurling league as Down have only three senior clubs, and it's always a struggle to pull together a quality panel.

"We've a good interest in numbers," adds Clarke, "but you're still picking from the same clubs and same people. But after losing in Ulster last year we all said we'd try that bit harder. And I think our attitude has really improved this year, among all the players. We hadn't won in Ulster in a while. But once the momentum built up I think all the players wanted to put the effort in."

They share some similarities with Newtownshandrum in that hurling dominates a small parish of about 600 people: "There's not much in Ballygalget," admits Clarke. "Everything is about the hurling really. There's no football or soccer or anything like that. So it's a big, big thing for us, and the club is buzzing.

"But we all know about Newtown's style of play. It's that running game they play, it's so hard to stop. I don't think anyone has fully counteracted it yet. Clare did it for about 40 minutes and it went downhill after that."

The fact Newtownshandrum so strongly influenced Cork's recent successful style of hurling - fast, furious, and so difficult counteract - has inevitably led to talk of another All-Ireland title.

Cork's most famous twins, Ben and Jerry O'Connor, remain the engine of the team, with newly-appointed county captain Pat Mulcahy the rock of the defence.

Club captain Brendan Mulcahy, brother of Pat, also attended yesterday's AIB press day in Dublin, but was cautious about revealing the true ambitions of the Cork champions.

"Hopefully the experience of 2004 will stand to us," he said, "But it's hard enough to come back up to championship status after the break. All we've done is play challenge games, and hopefully that will stand to us. But every team has to play to their strengths, and that's all we do. That hasn't changed, we just utilise our fast-paced hurlers as best we can."

Sunday's other semi-final is set for Thurles and features reigning champions James Stephens against Galway and Connacht champions Portumna.

Both games start at 2.30pm, with TG4 providing both live coverage from Thurles and a delayed transmission from Portlaoise.