Conor Clifford

**Yard of Pace** · 06/12/2010, 6:58 PM

66% of the vote! Rare for football fans to agree to such an extent. Can anyone tell me what kind of midfielder is Clifford? I've yet to see him play.

**Brendan 82** · 06/12/2010, 7:46 PM

Midfield General

**tommy_c12000** · 06/12/2010, 7:48 PM

Originally Posted by Yard of Pace

66% of the vote! Rare for football fans to agree to such an extent. Can anyone tell me what kind of midfielder is Clifford? I've yet to see him play.

I've only seen him twice play last season in the FA Youth Cup. Think they were playing Villa in the final. As described in the piece on the website, he looks to be well able to tackle and has a good eye for a pass. He got a cracker of a goal in last yr's final from distance so looks to be equipped with a powerful shot. Haven't seen him enough to make a proper judgement though, but he seems to have it all

**tetsujin1979** · 06/12/2010, 8:02 PM

Originally Posted by Yard of Pace

66% of the vote! Rare for football fans to agree to such an extent. Can anyone tell me what kind of midfielder is Clifford? I've yet to see him play.

I've seen him play twice this year for the U21s, vs Armenia in March, and Estonia in August.
My comments from those games:
from the Armenia thread: http://foot.ie/threads/132399-U21-Vs-Armenia/page2

The one positive was the performance of Chelsea's Conor Clifford in midfield. Full of energy, running and tackling, he looks a definite talent.

and from the Estonia thread: http://foot.ie/threads/138607-Under-...-10-8-11/page3

Originally Posted by tetsujin1979

The midfield of McCarthy, Gleeson and Garvan controlled possesion well in the middle of the park, and linked up with Clifford on the right. The Estonain right winger had previously enjoyed some space between Clifford and Coleman at right full, but with this space eliminated, his threat was removed.

To be honest, I don't remember him having much impact on the game, and he was playing right in front of where I was sitting in the second half. However, he was out of position as an old fashioned inside right, and seems to be far more comfortable in centre midfield.

There isn't really anyone like him in the squad at the moment, unless you count McCarthy. He like to receive the ball from the defence, and drive forward through the centre of the park to either pass to a teammate or shoot himself. He's mentioned a few times that he's learned a lot from Frank Lampard, but I think he plays a little behind where you would normally see Lampard on the pitch. He's be closer to Alonso in terms of position on the pitch, if not ability (yet) and while I would like to see him in a Chelsea jersey before the end of the season, a full season on loan with Plymouth would not be the worst thing either.

Just let's not start calling for Trapattoni's job because he is not called into a squad, ok?

**passinginterest** · 06/12/2010, 8:37 PM

I was at those two U21 games too and I said:
Armenia:

...Conor Clifford was a class apart from everyone else on the pitch... I expected more from Garvan as he was the most experienced but he was overshadowed by Clifford...

Estonia:

Clifford who got better and better as the game went on... Clifford looked the fittest player on the pitch to me, he seems to have a great engine, he is very small though.

Basically he's a bit small but a real box to box style midfielder, good eye for a pass, technically very tidy and a good shot on him.

**Charlie Darwin** · 06/12/2010, 9:19 PM

It's hard to tell what kind of player Clifford will be at Premier League level (should he make it) but he does seem to have similar attributes to Essien: low centre of gravity, power (obviously not as much as Essien), passing ability, shooting ability. If he could be even half the player Essien is I'd be happy.

**ken foree** · 08/12/2010, 4:15 PM

compilation here, some (brilliant) goals were likely posted earlier on in this thread. looks some player, at that level at least:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOahS8Dg9KM

**tommy_c12000** · 08/12/2010, 5:42 PM

Looks like an amazing talent. Fingers crossed. . . . . . .

**AlaskaFox** · 08/12/2010, 8:44 PM

Greenscene's League One player of the month:
http://greenscene.me/2010/12/greensc...-for-november/
"The Chelsea midfielder is on loan with Plymouth, and has had an immediate impact, winning the adoration of their fans with very consistent performances in the centre of the park. An astonishing percentage of visitors to the club’s official website (66%) voted him their player of the month for November."

**paul_oshea** · 08/12/2010, 10:19 PM

So he likes going from box to box

**tommy_c12000** · 08/12/2010, 11:15 PM

Originally Posted by paul_oshea

So he likes going from box to box

Don't we all

**tommy_c12000** · 11/12/2010, 11:28 PM

Another man of the match performance today in Plymouth's 2-0 victory:

http://www.pasoti.co.uk/talk/viewtopic.php?t=49235

**Sullivinho** · 12/12/2010, 1:52 AM

Originally Posted by tommy_c12000

Another man of the match performance today in Plymouth's 2-0 victory:

http://www.pasoti.co.uk/talk/viewtopic.php?t=49235

"Clifford for me was like watching Paul Scholes at times in a green shirt"

We can certainly hope.

**The Fly** · 21/12/2010, 8:38 PM

Clifford unlikely to stay at Plymouth

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/foo...-Plymouth.html

**Yard of Pace** · 21/12/2010, 11:46 PM

Bad news that.

Also, there was a big enough feature on him in the Sunday Times just gone, for anyone interested.

**drummerboy** · 22/12/2010, 8:10 AM

SSN reporting that his loan has been extended until Jan 22

**Kingdom** · 22/12/2010, 11:22 AM

Originally Posted by Yard of Pace

Bad news that.

Also, there was a big enough feature on him in the Sunday Times just gone, for anyone interested.

Yeah read that, wasn't bad. The move to Plymouth might have been decent, he says himself that he is seeing the harsher side of football life, with the Pilgrims being up the ****ter metaphorically speaking. Looking to go to a championship club on loan next and then seeing what happens with Chelsea.
I got the feeling from reading what he said that he's not going to hang around the reserves at chelsea for long, and that if there isn't significant progress he'll move. He's seen the likes of Kakuta and McEachrain move to first team despite being young so it is happening there.