The Cork footballers made a winning start to their 2010 campaign when they edged out Sigerson Cup holders CIT in a low-scoring senior football challenge at the CIT grounds in Bishopstown last night. Cork 1-3 CIT 0-5 Just back from a team holiday in Thailand and having opted out of the McGrath Cup, it was the first outing of the year for last year's beaten All-Ireland finalists. And despite fielding an experimental line-up against the students who are fine-tuning their preparations ahead of the start of the Sigerson Cup next month, manager Conor Counihan marked the season opener with a win. The low-scoring fare can be largely attributed to the fact that the game was restricted to two halves of 20-minute duration because of the atrocious weather conditions. Counihan used 24 players in all, including last year's All-Ireland under 21 winners Colm O'Driscoll and David Goold. Nemo veteran Derek Kavanagh started at full back, while dual star Eoin Cadogan lined out at centre back. The sides were level on 0-2 apiece at half-time before scores from Shane McCarthy and John Fitzpatrick pushed CIT two points clear on the restart. But a goal from substitute Sean Kiely gave Cork the lead, and even though McCarthy levelled again for the students from a free, Derek Kavanagh ensured that the Rebels had the final say when he landed the winning point. Scorers for Cork: S Kiely 1-0, P Kelly, J Hayes, D Kavanagh 0-1 each. CIT: S McCarthy 0-3 (0-1f), G Sayers, J Fitzpatrick 0-1 each. CORK: K Murphy; B Crowley, D Kavanagh, E Cotter; P Kissane, E Cadogan, R O'Sullivan; A O'Connor, F Goold; F Lynch, P Kelly, C O'Driscoll; J Masters, D Goold, J Hayes. Subs: (All half-time): P O'Neill for D Goold, S O'Brien for Masters, S Kiely for Lynch, N Murphy for F Goold, K O'Halloran for Murphy, N O'Donovan for R O'Sullivan, N O'Leary for Kissane, M Shields for A O'Connor, K O'Connor for Crowley. CIT: (All Cork unless stated) L Sheehan (Kerry); N Galvin, R Carey, S O'Donoghue; A Downes (Dublin), P O'Flynn, C O'Driscoll; S O'Hare (Waterford), A O'Sullivan; G Sayers (Kerry), P Kerrigan, S McCarthy; R Leahy, C Crowley, D Goulding. Subs: B Walsh for Sheehan, N Canty for Galvin, D Lynch for O'Flynn, R O'Dwyer for O'Donoghue, R Power for O'Driscoll, J Fitzpatrick for O'Hare, J O'Mahony for O'Sullivan, J O'Leary for Sayers, G White for Kerrigan, L Harrington for Goulding. Referee: C Lyons (Nemo Rangers). Tweet

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