All-Stars in their eyes
There’s greying Murphy, young gun Clifford and the mighty Cluxton all in the mix
THERE is quite some way to go before the invites for the GAA’s endof-season All-Stars bash hit the post, but Gaelic football’s movers and shakers are already out there to be seen.
Those invites will be decided by events over the next seven weeks but in the race for the biggest individual prize of all, the big hitters are already on the starting grid.
How the best perform in the biggest games over the coming weekends and which team gets over the All-Ireland line will frame the Footballer of the Year shortlist, but even from this far out, the candidates are already lined up.
Sportsmail, on form to date, picks out the 10 most likely.
1 MICHAEL MURPHY (DONEGAL)
He will be 30 next month and while greying around the ages, the man has never looked more impressive.
There are all kinds of reasons for that: his body shape has noticeably trimmed down but not at the expense of diluting his physical presence; he is free of the injuries which dogged him in the middle of his career; and he has a support cast of ball winners and hard runners that has lightened the load on those broad shoulders.
It has shown too; half of the 14 points he has scored have come from open play, but it is the almost telepathic relationship with his goalkeeper Shaun Patton that has seen him exercise a level of control on games, not least against Tyrone and Meath, that has bordered on the complete.
2 DAVID CLIFFORD (KERRY)
He has only been with us a wet day and he is already threatening to drain the thesaurus.
There are times when he feels more like a composite of the greats who went before him in a Kerry shirt. He has a bit of Bomber’s ball-winning ability, a healthy smattering of Gooch’s instincts — that slide rule pass to Paul Geaney the best non-completed pass of this summer’s championship — and a lot of Maurice Fitzgerald’s kicking action.
He recovered from surgery on his shoulder in the close season to carry on where he left off last year, with 10 of his 14 points thus far coming from open play.
3 JACK McCAFFREY (DUBLIN)
Of all the many obstacles facing Dublin’s challengers, putting the brakes on McCaffrey is possibly the most daunting.
Without reverting to a blanket — a gameplan which the champions have pretty much made redundant — allowing McCaffrey the space to run invites all kinds trouble.
It is not just that he is jetheeled, it is his awareness and his ball-playing skills — both in evidence when he rolled home a goal against Cork — which makes him so hard to stop.
And his consistency — he is a former player of the year and last year’s All-Ireland final man of the match — is a guarantee that his form will not taper off. of
4 4 CATHAL McSHANE (TYRONE)
Not quite from zero to hero, but not since Kieran Donaghy’s move from midfield to full-forward in 2006 have we seen a change in role have such a transformative impact on both a player and a team. McShane (left) has provided Tyrone with a presence in the full-forward line, but it is the menace that has come with it that has taken so many by surprise. Of the 2-38 he has racked up, a staggering 2-18 has come from open play and yet that tells only half the story, as his set-up play has bordered on the sublime. He is the main reason why Tyrone feel they can throw something different — despite reverting back to a heavily defensively nuanced game-plan — at Dublin this year.
5 STEPHEN O’BRIEN (KERRY)
He charts this high as a result of a sustained body of work which can be traced back right to the start of spring.
In many ways, he has gone against the Kerry grain in that he has been a late developer rather than a ready-made star, but for the past two seasons he has, along with Clifford, been Kerry’s most consistent player.
He has speed, but it his ambition — he always goes for the jugular — which has elevated his game to a new level.
And he is both a play-maker and finisher — in the latter role he set up Paul Geaney for Kerry’s only goal last weekend.
6 6 PAUL MANNION (DUBLIN)
For all the talk of the advantages conferred on Dublin, their capacity to help themselves is sometimes lost.
Their ability to develop good players into very good players has taken Paul Mannion to the brink of being a great one.
He has developed every aspect in his game — there are cornerbacks he could school in the tackle — but it is the sheer dropdead gorgeous quality of his kicking that takes the breath away.
He has already knocked over 14 points from open play this summer, and the sense is that the best is yet to come.
7 BRIAN FENTON (DUBLIN)
The current player of the year is more than just hanging around, his sustained excellence underlining the class of a rare talent.
In the process he has defied the notion that the award doubles as a curse — previous winners have tended to follow a defining season with a wash-out one — but after a subdued start his influence grows ever stronger by the game.
His ability, as a midfielder, to sting for scores is unrivalled and that continues as he has racked up 2-5 thus far.
8 JAMIE BRENNAN (DONEGAL)
The promise he showed last year has morphed into something far more substantial.
He has brought a bald-headed aggression to his play in terms of attacking every possible opportunity, while his speed and trickery makes him a nightmare to contain.
He has also sharpened up on his finishing skills — check out that sublime goal he scored against Tyrone in the Ulster semi-final — while, despite getting a finger poked in his eye in the pre-match warm-up against Meath, he still scored 0-3 in his most understated performance this summer to take his championship tally to 2-14.
9 STEPHEN CLUXTON (DUBLIN)
In a season where the goalkeeping standards have been ridiculously high at the very top – Donegal’s Shaun Patton and Tyrone’s Niall Morgan both excellent – the 37-year-old continues to thrive.
In truth, pressure off the restart tee has been minimal, but he marked his 100th championship appearance against Kildare by making two saves.
He followed that up with three more point-blank saves against Cork with the only goal conceded so far being Luke Connolly’s penalty conversion in the same game.
Should he captain Dublin to a fifth title in a row, it will hardly weaken his claim for Dublin’s No.1 to become football’s No.1.
10 DONAL KEOGAN (MEATH)
The chances are that if Meath fail to make it to the last four, Keogan (left) may fall off the top 10 radar. That would be more than a pity because of his sustained excellence — not just this summer but over the past three years — demands to be noted. In Gaelic football’s fantasy transfer market, Meath would make a killing on a player whose all round game — he is a terrific defender as well as a sublime ball carrier — is as good as anything out there.