The second coming
Not quite. After the getting-to-know-you season with the players last year, the management put the panel on weights and ran up some reasonable league results. If their plans went awry against Kerry, Corrigan focuses on the positives in the three-point defeat, such as the introduction of new blood into the Cork attack.
"Our initial reaction was disappointment," he says, "we'd trained very hard for the Kerry game and we were disappointed not to win. We put that disappointment away and got back training on the Thursday afterwards and decided we'd focus on our next game.
"We're excited about the full-forward line, we have good young fellas coming through. Fintan Goold is only 19, John Hayes isn't much older and they're ones for the future. We were happy with them in the Munster final. John Hayes was absolutely knackered, that's why we took him off, while we got 60 minutes out of Fintan, who we're trying to protect as best we can.
"We felt that we showed confidence in them and that's why we picked them again for the game with Sligo."
After the final, team captain Eoin Sexton said Declan O'Sullivan's goal wasn't the hammer blow it might have been. Corrigan was happy with that expression of belief.
"If the goal had come with 10 minutes to go you might have thrown your hat at it, whereas at the time it came we were playing well. Kerry broke up the field and got the goal, and what we found then was that they fell back into their own half-back line. We might have tried the long ball to by-pass that glut of players, but that's something that'll come with experience. You need to have games to work out thinking for yourself in a match if plan A doesn't work, then you switch to plan B."
Today the forceful Brendan Jer O'Sullivan starts for Cork in the only change from the Munster final and he offers the strength to implement any game plan.
"Micheál Ó Cróinín is a fine player, the ball just didn't run for him against Kerry. Brendan Jer brings some good strength and mobility to the forwards. He's a good passer and when he came on he took his chance; he won ball.
He did well for us in the league and he should help us win ball around the half-forward line against Sligo."
Sligo are something of an unknown quantity to Leeside fans, but Corrigan says Cork will be focusing on what they can control.
"We learned our lessons from the Fermanagh game last year and we've moved on from it. We want to focus on our own performance; up until last Sunday we didn't know who we were playing, but we trained since the Kerry game as if it were Kerry, Dublin, Armagh or Tyrone we were playing.
"We've not played much against Sligo; we don't know much about them but we've watched them on video.
"Fermanagh's ex-manager, Dom Corrigan is in charge of them and he did wonders with his former employers. Sligo are pretty good and they're well able to get numbers back to defend in depth. If we're not focused properly we'll be in trouble, but looking at the attitude of the players in training in the last couple of weeks that shouldn't be a problem."
He hopes support isn't an issue either. Cork's minors, juniors and seniors play in an unusual triple bill.
"Yes, it's great that the Cork supporters don't have to go to Croke Park for the second week in a row.
"Bringing Cork up to Dublin last Sunday was a joke, as was proved by the numbers at the game.
"Having the three games in Portlaoise is fantastic, particularly the junior game. We're keeping an eye on the juniors and I'm sure three or four of them will eventually make the senior panel. The minors are doing well too; they've turned their season around fantastically with that win over Kerry in the Munster final.
"Having Cork supporters in Portlaoise will give the seniors a huge lift when we lost to Fermanagh last year there weren't many Cork people in Croke Park."
It's not what Corrigan was used to when he wore the red jersey, when Cork contested five All-Ireland finals between 1987 and 1990. Other things change also. Take the vexed question of training: is it so different nowadays from his time?
"That's a question that would be debated in many counties. From our time I'd say this we just couldn't have trained any harder. There were nights you'd finish a session and be thinking 'Do I really have to go through all that again?'
"Having said that, one big difference is now everyone is doing it. Every team does it now whereas in our day five or six teams might have done it. Another huge difference is the off-the-field stuff. I can't believe the changes after training after a session we'd have a pint of milk or water and head away; now the lads come in and they're into ice baths for recovery and so on.
"Sometimes our recovery was two pints on the way home and that wasn't a bad thing either but regarding training sessions, since I got involved I haven't seen a session that a member of our team of the 80s couldn't have done. Likewise, if one of the present team was thrown into one of our training sessions they'd be fairly knackered.
"It's the other things now that make a big difference: the sports psychology, the rest, the ice baths, the diet. Especially the diet. When I was playing the week of a championship game the butcher in Macroom would throw you three or four steaks the week of a game against Kerry. Nowadays if you had a steak you'd be marched out of the dressing room."
One aspect of Cork football seems constant, however. Billy Morgan was Corrigan's coach in the glory days; now they're both in the back office planning another trip to the summit.
"In my opinion and the opinion of many, when the annals of Cork football are written, one man will stand out over everyone else, and that's Billy Morgan.
"His passion for Cork football is legendary and from my time he hasn't lost one ounce of his enthusiasm. All he wants is for the Cork footballers to go up the steps of the Hogan Stand in September.
His passion and enthusiasm for Cork football they're just infectious."
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