SAM YEAR FOR ICONIC DAVID

Clifford wins his third Footballer of the Year gong

- BY GARRY DOYLE

FOR a man who has scaled almost every peak Gaelic football can offer, David Clifford still talks with the freshness of someone who loves the climb.

The newly-crowned Footballer of the Year has endured the dips and savoured the highs, and when he looks back on 2025, he sees a season that refreshed and ultimately rewarded him.

"It's been a strange one," he begins. "We thought we were going well, and then we got rocked back on our heels when we lost to Meath (in the group stages).

"To be able to pick it back up for the final three games (against Armagh, Tyrone and Donegal) was special just the way it all came together."

By the end of 2025, the Fossa man was once again an All Star, Footballer of the Year, All-Ireland winner, and a player who seemed to have rediscovered the joy that comes when football is played on instinct.

Yet his success, as he points out, was built on the hurt of 2024. The disappointment of that previous campaign lingered through the winter. Kerry had stumbled when it mattered most, and Clifford knew the entire setup needed a reset. The League became the platform. "We had no other choice but to put a massive focus on the League," he says. "We'd been poor the year before and lost to Armagh in the semifinal, so naturally we wanted to put down a few markers. Winning the League wasn't the main thing it was about performances and getting our form back."

Kerry did all that. The League victory mattered less than the sense of renewal that came with it and with the arrival of a new backroom team.