By Aaron McNally
Absolutely outrageous.
When David Clifford was lighting it up at minor level just two years ago, not many people doubted that he’d be a star at the senior grade.
But the fact that he transitioned into the senior team and became a standout player on the Kerry team so quickly may have surprised some.
The Fossa man took the championship by storm and deservedly won Young Footballer of the Year as well as an All-Star at the end of his first year as a senior player.
Another man familiar with the green and gold of Kerry is goalkeeper Shane Murphy. Murphy broke into the Kerry team in 2018 and has been solid between the posts.
The goalkeeper transferred from Kilcummin to Dr Crokes in 2016 and on Sunday can win his 2nd All Ireland since moving to the Killarney based club.
These two men have recently featured in a brilliant skills challenge video. The video, put together by broking company, GMHD.ie, shows the two go head to head taking shots, some of them from ridiculous angles.
From 1.42 to 2.20 shows both players at their brilliant best.
David Clifford with the most delicious crossbar challenge effort that you'd only expect from David Clifford đź‘Ś
This is a great video from broking group https://t.co/hL1UabnQjW that really shows off the kicking techniques of Clifford and @DrCrokesGAA goalkeeper Shane Murphy đź‘Ź pic.twitter.com/ZAedmUtsHM
— SportsJOE (@SportsJOEdotie) March 14, 2019
After three kicks each from around the 50m line, (one on the right, one on the left and one on the middle) the score was two all with both of them missing one each.
The challenge was brought to the sideline for the next two shots each and this is where it really heated up. After a narrow miss from Clifford from the right sideline, Murphy followed up with a beauty off the outside of his right boot.
Murphy then nailed the next one from the other sideline off the ground before Clifford replied with an outside of the boot wonder score of his own to narrow the deficit to one.
Next up was a shot each from the right corner flag and the standard did not drop a single bit. After Murphy hit another outrageous outside of the boot score, Clifford took out the trusty left boot to ensure there were two magnificent scores from the corner flag.
Their talents were taken to the penalty spot for the next section and with Clifford outscoring Murphy 2-1 after three each, it meant a sudden death crossbar challenge was needed to decide the winner.
And after everything these two had done in the challenge, the crossbar challenge did not disappoint either with Murphy narrowly missing but Clifford providing a class effort as he hit the crossbar on his first try.
An absolutely epic skills challenge and if the scores are flying over like that for Kerry in the summer, then the KIngdom will be in business.
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