The squad will follow the same itinerary as they have for the past four seasons, departing for Thurles via coach at 9.30am. Selector Martin Bowen said this morning that they are looking forward to the game.

“We wrapped up our training last night, everybody came through ok and we believe the weather won’t be as bad as forecast.”

Diarmuid O’Sullivan has fully recovered for the eye injury that threatened to rule him out, while Neil Ronan, who broke his thumb last month, is on the bench.

Gerald McCarthy says he is not looking an inch beyond his first championship game in charge but stresses that the ultimate goal is the All-Ireland.

“If you are successful in Cork you have won an All Ireland, if you don’t win an All Ireland you are not successful. I know that. The followers and hurling people in Cork are very demanding are our pedigree is such that every time we set out we expect to win a Munster championship and an All Ireland.

“That’s our big expectation, our big hurdle and what we want to do.’’

Earlier in the league campaign there were rumours of player unrest, and three members of the panels most notably Wayne Sherlock, departed.

“We are dealing with our panel of players now. It’s not a time for looking backwards and we are only looking forward and we are happy that the panel we have picked will do the job for us,” says McCarthy.

“Our preparations have gone tremendously well, the buzz in training last week and the intensity of it was absolutely brilliant and we could not ask for anymore.’’

Caution accompanies optimism entering Sunday’s game and McCarthy believes that it will be much more difficult that some people might be envisaging.

“We are quietly confident that we can win this game on Sunday but we know that we are going to have it very tough. Clare are a very tough, hard championship side, they always are.”

Article courtesy of the Evening Echo newspaper.