Clifford ‘seems to be very driven this year’ says McGuiness

BY RYAN FERRY

TRYING to stop David Clifford would give many an intercounty manager a headache but Jim McGuinness was certainly in relaxed form at Tuesday’s press evening.

Kerry knew they were in the final a day earlier but won’t hold their media briefing until Saturday.

Donegal are keen to get any issues outside of the training ground sorted as quickly possible.

McGuinness is a strong orator and he covered a wide range of topics over the space of thirty minutes with the assembled media.

Unsurprisingly, it wasn’t long before the matter of trying to stop David Clifford was put on the agenda.

Clifford is the GAA’s star man and posted 1-9 in the semi-final against Tyrone.

He has two Footballer of the Year awards to his name already and is favourite to make it a third this season.

If Donegal are to win the Sam Maguire Cup, they will have to try and negate his influence, but that is easier said than done.

“Myself and Mark Anthony were chatting about it on the way up in the car,” said McGuinness with a nod to his oldest son, who himself is a talented GAA player.

“We were talking about the fact that he could be the best player to ever play the game.

“Time will tell on that as well I suppose and you can never make that assertion until someone hangs up the boots but certainly he is an exceptional football player.

“He seems to be very driven this year. He’s carrying the fight with a determination and an attacking aggressiveness.

“When he sees a gap he goes for it, and with some of the scores he’s getting in Croke Park, he’s not kicking it over, he’s firing it over.

“He’s putting down markers and I think he’s leading from the front.

“It’s a huge challenge but there’s a number of what you would call marquee forwards in the Kerry team.

“His brother (Paudie) is obviously in that bracket as well and Seanie O’Shea and a lot of other players that have been incredible servants and know their way around Croke Park.

“The challenge on that front is absolutely huge but at the end of the day, all challenges at this level are going to be huge.

“You’re playing in the biggest game of the year and there’s going to be nothing easy.”

McGuinness spoke about his soccer career which took him to Celtic, Beijing Sinobo Guoan, and Charlotte Independence and the relentless nature of the professional industry with matches coming every couple of days.

There is a little bit more time between GAA Championship games but even that landscape has changed from his first stint in charge.

Back then there were often three or four weeks between matches but things are squeezed in now.

Remarkably the All-Ireland Final will be Donegal’s eleventh game of the championship.

McGuinness feels his soccer experiences should stand to them but pointed out that all teams are getting to grips with the season and the implications of the new rules.

“I’d like to think so.

“But I think at this stage and Kerry have played a lot of games themselves everybody is just getting used to that from a Gaelic Football point of view.

“Everyone just has to adapt. We have got six days here or seven days and what do we have to do to get the data pulled together and to get the video pulled together and the information we need and bring that back to the players at a level that they believe you and understand it.

“Then you go to the pitch and try and bring it to life.

“It was great to get out on the pitch tonight and start looking at a few things.

“And on Thursday everyone else will join us.”

While Donegal have defeated Division 2 sides in their last three games, they have played 11 matches and they are battled-hardened coming into the final.

McGuinness said: “I think you learn more about your processes.

“But then there is jeopardy because you could lose.

“There’s nothing like a championship game to tell you what’s not working or what needs to be tweaked. That’s definitely the case.

“More games in that regard definitely helps you to refine and fine tune but you’re talking about a 20% shift maybe.

“You could have 80% of the things you’re working on and then there’s always that 15 or 20% for the opposition you’re playing.

“We come up with a different game plan for every game.

“Every single team we have played has a different set of variables and they are going to do things differently and attack differently.

“They will have different kick-outs and some of them will be brilliant in transitional moments and some of them won’t and all of these things will factor into the game.

“The final will be no different. It’s a completely different set of variables to the semi-final.

“That’s what we are in the middle of now. You have to work through that information and bring it to the players and sit down and say what’s the plan, and who’s part of it.

“We’re two days into that process now and you’d like to think by the weekend that you will come out the other side of that and turn the attention to yourself and what we need to do.”