Éamonn Fitzmaurice: Working with David Clifford taught me life's greatest lesson
MAIN MAN: Kerry’s David Clifford. Pic: INPHO/Ryan Byrne
THE most disappointing defeat I had as manager of Kerry was the 2017 All-Ireland semi-final defeat to Mayo - apt, for the week that’s in it - after a replay. We were a point up in the drawn game, had possession, with seconds left on the clock and didn’t see it out.
We didn’t perform in the replay and lost by five. There were other gutting defeats but the nature of that one has remained with me. In most of the other big losses we had been someway close to the best version of ourselves, but had come up short. While still jarringly disappointing that has to be accepted as part of sport. The under performance in that game grated. Still does.
Part of the pain was personal, and centred on the fact that I held back our 4-4-4 kickout press that we had pioneered the year before against Dublin. I wanted to hold it for the final. That was a mistake. Mayo repeatedly got away short kickouts where they won the foot races. That press would have bothered David Clarke. We had beaten Dublin in the league final the previous spring and I felt that we had the game and the personnel to try and take them down. We never got to test that hypothesis.
After that Mayo defeat, as was my custom, I went to ground. I had five years done as manager and sensed it was time to move on. I felt the group would benefit from a new voice and a change of direction. I loved the role, but every year at the end of season I always honesty reflected on what was best for the team, and what was best for Kerry.
I discussed the situation ad nauseam with my most trusted consigliere, my wife Tina, and eventually we came to the conclusion that it was best to wind up. There was a wave of new talent on the way and in all likelihood it would take two to three years to bed them in and win an All-Ireland. Before I approached the chairman of the county board Tim Murphy, I went to have a chat with selector Mikey Sheehy. He had been by my side since the start and I wanted to let him know the lie of the land. I called up to his house to inform him and found Mikey in rare form. He was having none of it! He forced me to rethink. He made a lot of valid points, but among them was the fact that there would be an opportunity to work with a new up and coming phenom called David Clifford.
I was initially aware of David through the schools scene in Kerry. We had won the Hogan Cup in 2014 and 2015 with Pobalscoil Chorca Dhuibhne but by 2016 it was a David-led Sem that were ready to take up that mantle. He was brilliant in that final in Croke Park scoring 2-5 against a quality St Pats Maghera side that featured Conor Glass and Shane McGuigan. He also excelled in the minor-winning campaigns of 2016 and 2017. We actually considered involving him in the aforementioned 2017 replay against Mayo. The minors won their semi-final the day of our drawn game. When we balanced it up we felt it would be unfair to David and to the minors and it could undermine the spirit of the senior squad by dropping a minor into the squad out of the blue, albeit an extremely talented one.
I first sat down with him for a coffee in Tralee in October 2017 to discuss the year ahead. His dad Dermot dropped him to the meeting. He still didn’t have his full driving licence. I didn’t need a reminder of his youth but that provided it anyway. I was impressed with him from the off. His quiet confident personality shone through. He couldn’t wait to get going. He was curious and asked all the right questions. It was energising to be in his company. I asked him about Australia as he was strongly linked with a move down under at the time. He reassured me he had zero interest. He wanted to win big with his club Fossa and with Kerry.
A couple of weeks later he was invited to a different type of meeting. In previous seasons I would have met every player in the off season for a debrief and a look forward. Those meetings were invaluable to me but for the upcoming 2018 season I decided to involve the whole management team as I felt everyone would benefit from hearing what the players had to say. I sat at one end of the table and said practically nothing and left the lads quiz and challenge each player. Liam Hassett was the dog that went after fellas with the hard questions. He thrived in the role! He threw a few scuds in David's direction, to assess him. He didn’t even blink and handled everything with aplomb. I struggled not to laugh. Liam was doing his level best to ruffle David's feathers, but try as he might he couldn’t and it frustrated him. It was brilliant. David must have left that meeting wondering what the hell is the story with that crowd?
I had a little tradition that I would shake the hand of any new player and welcome them into the setup on their first night on grass with us. For David’s first session I continued with this custom and what struck me was how comfortable he was from the off. He looked me straight in the eye as if to silently implore me to just leave him at it. To test his pulse that night we put Shane Enright - one of our stickiest and toughest backs - on him to welcome him to senior football. When we played a match towards the end of the session Pádraig Corcoran reffed it and I stood off to the side with Mikey to observe. The first ball David won he turned Shane, blew past him and stuck a rocket in the back of the net. His kick sounded different. Like a professional golfer striking the ball. Pure. Myself and Mikey looked at each other and started laughing. Here we go.
For his first competitive start we played Donegal in the opening game of the league in Killarney. While it wasn’t something we normally did I felt it was important to mark the occasion, without the squad realising it was specifically for David’s first game with Kerry. We gathered in the Brehon hotel the morning of the game and I asked Mikey to present the jerseys to the lads. The iconic 13 presenting his first number 13 senior jersey to someone special with the potential to be that Mikey Sheehy, Maurice Fitzgerald or Colm Cooper figure. It felt right, and it was.
When I look back at 2018 now the thing that stands out for me about David Clifford is how quickly he settled into the whole thing, with no adaptation phase. While there were still some wily veterans around the place it was a young squad, with seven players making their championship debuts that summer, many of whom will feature in Sunday's All-Ireland final.
He partnered up with Kevin McCarthy and Shane Enright and they became fast friends from the off. Fair to say he got a fair education off the two boys. His performances throughout the season for someone so young were excellent. Remarkably, he sustained them throughout a long year. Players in their debut season often fall away as the year goes on from the sheer load and intensity of it all. Not David.
After Fossa won the Junior All-Ireland in Croke Park in early 2023 the team and management stopped off in a bar for a glorious private hour, before embracing the joyous mayhem of the hotel with family and supporters. We had some laugh, over a few pints. I was in David’s company and the stories were flying back and forth. He had a couple of great yarns about Séamus Moynihan when he was involved with Fossa. (That’s for another day, don’t worry Seamo!).
One nice one he threw at me was from our first super 8s game in 2018 when Galway beat us in Croke Park, which ranks second in those unsavoury defeats as Kerry manager. We were playing Monaghan away the following Sunday so we had arranged to stay in Dublin on the Sunday night, to be as prepared as we possibly could be for the following weekend. It would allow to do our recovery collectively, have a video analysis review meeting on the Monday morning and head down the road ahead of schedule for the week. The performance and defeat meant that plan took an avant face. The team watched the entire match together, never a good idea. We had never done this previously but the thinking was to have an honest collective review and purge it from our systems before departing for Kerry.
Everyone was tired and cranky and the players were divided into groups of three or four and had to give feedback on the display. David was in a group with some old pros. When their group decided to give some feedback about the positional changes the management had made during the game David was nominated as spokesperson and unwittingly became the lamb to the slaughter. It was a fraught meeting and I had decided not to say anything for the most part. I wanted the players to drive it and for the rest of the management to respond only if really required. I can still recall one particularly memorable contribution from Maurice Fitz!
Anyway, when David gave the feedback I snapped at him that we would make whatever changes we wanted and if I wanted to put him in goals the following weekend that is where he would be. The one fella who had held up his side of the bargain with his performance was the one who got both barrels. He just looked at me and sat down but again clearly it didn’t knock a stir out of him. I think I mentioned as much to him on Monday before we pointed the bus for home. He finished that topsy turvy season where a young team played some fantastic, if inconsistent football, as our top scorer in championship, as young player of the year and with an All-Star. He had announced himself.
During the spring of 2021, I got a call out of the blue from Adrian Sheehan, a Ballyheigue man that I hurled against with Lixnaw and hurled with underage for Kerry. He is married in Fossa and was in charge of their senior team and wanted me to get involved with them as a coach. While I was hesitant as I had never been involved with anyone outside of my own club, school or county it was an easy sell. The opportunity to work with David again and Paudie for the first time was too good to turn down. It was to be for one season but I ended I up staying for four. By the time I finished, when Adrian called it a day, I felt totally welcome and at home in Fossa. I still get a warm feeling when I think of that time.
The Clifford family define all that is good about the club. Back then their dad Dermot was the chairman. I also got to know Dermot’s late wife Ellen and their sister Shelley. Dermot’s knowledge of football is encyclopaedic, probably only bettered by Ellen’s. He got to the Know Your Sport final back in the day. His specialist topic? John Egan. The two boys didn’t lick it off the ground. I’m very fond of Dermot (and the two boys) and we keep in touch. Once he told me that I will always be part of David’s story because I gave him his start. I laughed and replied “Dermot, a blind man would have given David his start!” In a club capacity David led from the front by performance. Paudie was the more vocal of the pair. The biggest thing I learned while with Fossa is that the Clifford boys are winners, and that they work extremely hard at their craft, both in the gym and on the field honing their skills. The harder the challenge the more they rise to it. Both always stand up when the need is greatest. One or the other, or indeed both, could be decisive factors this weekend.
While David is an incredible footballer he is also an absolute gentleman. For someone who can’t go too far without being recognised he is unceasingly generous with his time. Last winter my nine-year-old daughter Faye was doing a school project on her favourite sports man. No prizes for guessing her muse. She asked me could I get onto him to see if he would answer a few questions for her. The probing questions included his favourite colour, his favourite food and what he liked to do when he was nine. I was conscious of the amount of these requests that he gets but when your girl asks it is hard to say no. I texted David and he came back with a video message answering all of the questions (for the record: green, chicken curry, play sport with Paudie and Shelley and collect GAA jerseys from other counties.) It made a little girl's day.
It sums up all you need to know about him. Some times the nice guys do win.
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