Galway forward Conor Cooney is looking forward to the challenge of retaining the Liam MacCarthy Cup in 2018.

The Tribesmen ended a 29-year wait for All-Ireland SHC honours in September and thoughts are already beginning to turn to the new season and the prospect of emulating the 1987-88 All-Ireland winning teams.

"Yeah we grew up on stories of what those teams achieved and I suppose they were idols to us and yeah, it's something you want to emulate, to do a back-to-back," Cooney explained to the Irish Times on the PwC All Stars tour to Singapore. 

"They did it in '88 so absolutely, it's something you'd set out to try and achieve. It's not easy, they're such fine margins. You're trying to keep the pressure off in a way and set out and get yourself right and do your training as you would do it anyway and I suppose what happens, happens.

"When we did win there was an overwhelming feeling of relief. We'd been under a lot of pressure for a long time because the Galway public is mad into hurling and I suppose they expect so much every year and we finally achieved the goal we set out to achieve.

"It's a new year coming and it'll be a fresh start coming back to square one and every team will be going the whole hog to try and win it so you'll have to have yourself 100 per cent right and be right for championship.

"We probably wouldn't have been let back across the Shannon if we lost. So I suppose it puts a lot of demons to rest."

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