SHROUDED IN the anonymity of their earliest championship exit in five years, Cork footballers’ campaign to regain the All-Ireland they won in 2010 got under way at the weekend.

Manager Conor Counihan says there will be no major changes to his playing panel, which although open at the moment, will be trimmed back before the National League begins next month.

“There’ll come a point in the next couple of weeks when we have to cut back on numbers, depending on injuries and other commitments. But you wouldn’t want to be leaving it open for too long. We’ll be giving a chance to anyone who’s performing well but if you’re asking if there’ll be wholesale change, that won’t be happening.”

Last season’s championship fizzled out with a mounting injury problem so Sunday’s big win over Clare in the McGrath Cup was notable for the return of one of the long-term injured Colm O’Neill, who scored 2-4 on his comeback from a cruciate ligament injury.

Counihan emphasises it was one step on a long journey for the young Ballyclough forward and says it will be a while before other key forwards Ciarán Sheehan and Daniel Goulding are back.

“Colm will be the first to be aware that there are bigger challenges ahead. It will be May before Ciarán returns and then Daniel Goulding will be March before he’s back.

“David Goold is also out with a cruciate (sustained earlier this month in training) – which is another one and is becoming all too common now.”

The close season saw the retirement of two former All Stars Anthony Lynch and John Miskella but otherwise Cork hope to be at full strength for the summer. Counihan is optimistic his team’s comparatively long break will have helped to recharge the batteries.

“I suppose having been involved in the latter stages for a good few years, you’re hoping that it could help recapture a bit of freshness or hunger that being on the outside for a while might bring.

“It’s difficult to unravel. Without the injuries it would have been easier to work out the effect of winning the All-Ireland. Once you’re champions you’re there to be shot at and teams lift their game so maintaining hunger would have been a definite challenge but with all of the injuries we’ll never know the full story.

“But the statistics tell you everything about putting All-Irelands back to back.”

Counihan is happy to acclimatise in the McGrath Cup but isn’t surprised that Munster rivals Kerry have opted to sit out the competition.

“I can understand. They would have a lot of clubs involved in the All-Ireland series at senior, junior and intermediate level and others involved with colleges so I can understand why they might want to skip it.”

Having won league titles for the past three years, Cork could be forgiven for taking things a bit easier but their manager reminds you that the competition has become an important part of the season.

“You’d always like to be competitive and although we all accept that the ultimate ambition is to win the championship, the teams that do well in the league have invariably been successful in the championship.

“Dublin only lost one match last season in the league (defeated by Cork in the final) and they’re All-Ireland champions now. We did the same thing the previous year.”

Meanwhile, further details of this year’s Dublin GAA Spring Series were announced yesterday. The county’s All-Ireland football champions will play their three league matches as part of double bills at Croke Park over the next two months.

As with last year, there will be musical acts performing between the matches on each evening.

On Saturday fortnight the opening Division One fixture against last year’s All-Ireland finalists Kerry will feature The Rubberbandits playing after the Division Two fixture between Kildare and Tyrone.

The second home match against Armagh, together with the county hurlers’ fixture against Cork, is on March 11th with Meath band Ham Sandwich performing between the matches.

The programme is not under lights, as the Six Nations rugby match between Ireland and Scotland had already been scheduled for the Saturday of that weekend with an evening kick-off.

And on Saturday, March 24th, Dublin hurlers face Tipperary whereas the footballers re-enact the controversial All-Ireland semi-final against Donegal with the musical interlude yet to be confirmed.

Ticket pricing remains keen with a three-match package costing €30 for an adult and €10 for a child.

Individual ticket prices are €13 and €5 respectively.