2022 WAS NOT one week old when Jack O’Connor made it clear that he meant business.
The then-three-time All-Ireland winning boss was returning for his third stint at the helm of the Kingdom, with a low-key opening assignment: A McGrath Cup group game against Limerick on a Wednesday evening on 5 January.
Billy Lee could have been excused for expecting to face an experimental side. He must have received quite the land when the Kerry starting XV dropped, stacked with front-liners.
The game was over as a contest within minutes. David Clifford picked off 1-4 before being pulled at the half-way mark.
Game number one of 2022 for the Fossa star was in the books, in somewhat understated fashion. But it was a sign of things to come.
His final outing of the year came in Fossa’s Munster Junior Championship final win over Kilmurry of Cork. Clifford signed off just how he started the year. With a hefty personal tally of 0-10, leading his side to victory.
Everything that happened in the 30 matches sandwiched in between could not have gone much better. The sole blip coming in the Sigerson Cup final, as his UL side fell to NUIG. Given that every other competition in which he played resulted in silverware, that shortcoming in the third level showpiece is unlikely to cause him too many sleepless nights.
The numbers have been widely shared. 32 games. 20-169 scored. Seven competitions entered. Six titles won.
In truth, that only goes some of the way to illustrate his feats.
New heights were reached on the field, images of which illuminated the summer. The searing pace in bursting past Padraig O’Hora in the League final. Tormenting Mayo once more in June, despite only being half-fit. The soaring leaps to claim marks against Dublin and Galway in the business end of the Championship. His point-taking that mesmerised all at Jones’ Road. The composure to nail a late pressure free in front of Hill 16 in the final. The slaloming runs. The unique kicking style.
All of which enshrined his box office status.
What has followed this winter is pictures and videos emerging on a weekly basis of Clifford thronged after Fossa matches, patiently satisfying the vast demand of autograph and selfie-hunters.
A video of his goal for Fossa against Listry garnered just shy of 400,000 views on Twitter alone.
David Clifford - In the immortal words of Jimmy Magee "Different Class.....Different Class"@Kerry_Official @FossaGaa pic.twitter.com/8ecHKKIpj4
— John C. O'Shea (@jcoshea) November 12, 2022
The Munster Championship semi-final meeting with Castlemahon of Limerick was a 1,500 sell-out. Stories of supporters travelling from all over the country to see his feats in the flesh. Junior football has never enjoyed such mass appeal.
“There’s talks already that if David Clifford could get his club to an All-Ireland final, that you’d have the biggest crowd ever inside in Croke Park for an All-Ireland club final. And this is only junior level,” Marc Ó Sé said on The42 GAA Weekly.
“That in itself is saying something. If you got Fossa to a junior final in Croke Park, I’d imagine there would be people queueing up the gates to watch him.
“In Castlemahon, I think the attendance was 1,500. But the commentator was saying there was far more than that there.
“There was fellas there with Dublin jerseys. People travelled down as far as Monaghan by all accounts to watch him. And even after the game, the crowds of people that were there, trying to get photographs with the guy. That’s bound to take its toll on someone as young as that. And to be fair to him, he’s obviously a very mature guy to be able to burden all that on his shoulders, because he’s still young.”
It has been clear for a long time that Clifford’s is an old head on young shoulders.
He first imprinted his name on the national psyche in the 2016 Hogan Cup final, leading St Brendan’s Killarney past St Pat’s Maghera of Derry.
Both teams were stacked full of emerging talent. Clifford lined out alongside Dara Moynihan, while Conor Glass, Shane McGuigan and Shea Downey were among the future county stars in opposition.
But Clifford’s star shone brightest, scoring 2-5, and it was clear at that point that greatness was in store.
His manager Gary McGrath made lofty comparisons at full-time.
“David is 16. He is a phenomenal talent. David Clifford reminds me every day at training of no one else but Maurice Fitzgerald. I can see it in him. I will be killed for saying it,” he told reporters.
“That is who he reminds me of. I have said it to people on the quiet. He is a big talent. If he is nurtured and looked after, he has a big career in front of him.”
Armed with what we have seen in the intervening six years, we can safely say McGrath was bang on the money.
“I remember that year, we played [Coláiste na] Sceilge in Cromane in the O’Sullivan Cup final,” McGrath now tells The42, reminiscing on that 2016 campaign.
“And Maurice was over Coláiste na Sceilge. David’s father would be from South Kerry anyway. So they would have played football [together]. His uncles would have played football with Maurice and probably went to school with Maurice.
“I just remember Maurice coming up talking to David after the game. And it just reminded me of looking at a young Maurice Fitzgerald again, heading off on his football career.”
For McGrath, coaching a young Clifford in ‘The Sem’ was a seamless process.
“He just loved training,” he details. “Like any young fella, he didn’t like any of the physical training! But you just gave him a ball. He always wanted to improve and he was always trying stuff at training, trying to improve his skills, trying to improve his kicking, his positional sense.
“And he loves to learn and he was always eager to learn and to lap up information on that. He’d just soak it up.
“When David spoke, everybody used to just sit up and listen to him. He has the respect of all the lads. He’s a natural leader. He does his talking on the field. He’s actually a very very good speaker. He’s quite shy, quite humble. But when he speaks, you tend to let him speak because he speaks very, very well.
“I’m teaching here now 20 years, and he’s by far the most gifted footballer. Closely followed in fairness by, we had James O’Donoghue a few years previously. We’re lucky in that sense that we had these stars coming through, and you could see it in them from a young age, they’re just exceptionally good.
“They fit into a team. They’d never want any extra exposure growing up. And you wouldn’t give some of that to a young fella anyway because you want to keep them very grounded as a 16, 17-year-old. You don’t want them to get carried away with themselves.
“But yeah, you just knew in the back of your mind that these fellas had something special.”
McGrath has transitioned from coach to colleague, with Clifford now a PE teacher in St Brendan’s.
The 23-year-old is already working with the next generation.
“He’s training our first years and Gavin [White] as well with the first year team,” McGrath outlines.
“We’re blessed that we have such good young fellas involved in the school.
“The first few weeks, the numbers that were going out were frightening to first year training.
“Obviously, those lads went home every Wednesday after training buzzing, talking to their parents delighted with it. And you just see it around the town, they’re saying ‘isn’t it great to have David Clifford teaching in the school’.”
What has been clear throughout 2022 is that the bigger the stage, the more Clifford relishes it.
“David loves finals. The bigger the occasion, the better he gets,” McGrath notes. “It brings the best out of him.”
Eight points in the All-Ireland final win over Galway was evidence enough. But so too was his showing in the Kerry Premier Junior Championship decider.
Marc Ó Sé was Listry manager, plotting to limit the Footballer of the Year that day. Ultimately, those plans were foiled as Clifford helped himself to 2-12 in the extra-time victory.
“Look, we had all the plans for him. And believe it or not, the players we had on him did quite well on him,” Ó Sé explains.
“He’s just a different class, as Jimmy Magee once said. He’s got it all. And some of the points he kicked in Fitzgerald Stadium were just incredible. There was one point he kicked, it looked as if it was going over the stand. And just the way that it curled back in, frightening stuff.
“He’s just an unnatural talent. We’re just lucky he’s from this county. He’s phenomenal.
“David Clifford, you make so many plans for this guy. But they go out the window, don’t they?”
But ultimately, the 2007 Footballer of the Year is relieved that the majority of the time, he will not be trying to limit Clifford, but rather cheer him on in the green and gold jersey.
“When you’re on the wrong end of it, it’s horrible,” he laughs.
“You just know that this guy is a freak of nature. Somebody described him there lately to me that he’s a cross between Donaghy and the Gooch. And when you think about it, he’s every bit as big as Donaghy, but he’s got all the skills of the Gooch.
“I heard a good story about him lately. After the All-Ireland, the Kerry captain Joe O’Connor, who is from Austin Stacks, they had a [home-coming celebration].
“They were having a few pints inside in the local pub. And in came the Bomber Liston. There was a few of the Kerry lads around there, and Bomber turned to Clifford and he gave him a wink and said, ‘We’ll tell the boys that full-forward is the hardest position to play’.
“David Clifford turned to Bomber and he said, ‘It was easy for you. When I’m playing inside full-forward, there’s two sweepers marking me every time. I don’t know what you’re talking about’.
“Bomber, who is usually the life and soul of the party, and centre of attention, there wasn’t a word out of him for the rest of the night. He quietened the Bomber!”
On the field the new year promises new frontiers, as he braces for an assault on the All-Ireland junior club championship with Fossa.
One reservation of Ó Se’s, however, is the danger of burnout:
“Where I feel sorry for David Clifford, this guy is going since January, solid 12 months.
“So the worry that I would have for David Clifford is in maybe March, April, May. Jack O’Connor will have to be very mindful of him. He will have to get a period of time where he just gets a break.
“It’s a hard one for him, because everyone is pulling out of him really. That’s a tough place to be. But he has performed so well, he doesn’t let the side down. He’s obviously a very strong, steely, tough character. As is his brother Paudie.
“Their dad, Dermot, is the chairman of the club in Fossa. They’re real GAA people. I work with their uncle, Fergus. They’re GAA to the core.
“There was talks a few years ago that he was going off to Australia playing AFL. That was never going to happen, I don’t think. This man was born to play with Kerry and win All-Irelands. Thankfully now we’re seeing that, and we’re delighted he’s from Kerry.”
With a dream 2022 odyssey now in the books, thoughts turn to 2023 and beyond.
Following the conclusion of Fossa’s winter foray, he will rejoin the Kingdom set-up as Jack O’Connor’s charges bid to repeat their feats of the last 12 months.
The fact that Kerry’s eight-year All-Ireland ‘drought’ was considered such suggests there is no possibility of them resting on their laurels. Anything other than retaining the Sam Maguire Cup will be deemed a failure in the southwest.
For Clifford, that pursuit will offer another platform upon which to showcase his majesty.
Still at such a young age, the sky appears to be the limit.
After tipping him for such feats from so young an age, McGrath says we have still not yet seen the best of David Clifford:
“He’s developing his game every year. When he left here in 2016, you’re thinking, how far can he go? And looking at him, you’re thinking ‘when is he going to plateau?’
“He’s going to a new level every single season which is great.
“I think we haven’t seen the best of him yet. As good as he is, I think he can play at this level for a good few years to come.”