David Clifford had a lot of hype coming out of minor football.
The Fossa forward was dominant at underage level and kicked 4-4 in the All-Ireland minor final against Derry in 2017.
Last year he made an immediate impact with Kerry and quickly asserted himself as one of the Kingdom’s go to scorers with a string of stellar performances in the Super 8s.
David Clifford is extraordinary. Super 8s
0-02 from 2 on frees (yellow)
4-00 from 4 on goal attempts (red)
0-12 from 17 (71%) on point attempts (white = left, black = right)That’s 78% (4–14 from 23) in total scoring ~11 points more than an avg intercounty player would #Yeesh pic.twitter.com/mTuVycDcZP
— dontfoul (@dontfoul) August 8, 2018
Clifford is a natural scorer but he told The GAA Hour this week that he’s trying to slow down more in training and focus on his ball striking.
“I do a lot of kicking for scores and a lot of ball striking,” said Clifford.
“If anything is going to let me down it’s probably not getting a good strike on a shot or maybe rushing a shot so it’s just trying to slow down in those one or two seconds and make sure you strike.
“It’s funny Barry John Keane just said to me a few times that you’re trying to kick the paint off the ball rather than just striking and where it’s going will probably just look after itself so the big thing I work on is just trying to get consistent ball striking.”
Clifford has said that he leans on Maurice Fitzgerald at times for advice but that the Kerry great has higher standards for accuracy than most.
“Maurice is excellent at knowing when to say something to you and when to leave you alone,” added Clifford.
“Maurice always talks about the black spot so just going over the bar isn’t good enough for Maurice. It has to be over the black spot.
“You’re just trying to caress the ball over rather than kick through it. It’s probably a pretty common thing among forwards.”
