There are plenty of position battles going on as D.C. United moves toward the just-over-two-weeks-away mark from its March 19 season opener.
Does goalkeeper count among those? Sorta. That is, if Bill Hamid is healthy, which he says he is. But right now, it doesn’t look like he’ll be in the net for the first two, and possibly all three D.C. United preseason matches in Charleston, S.C., starting this weekend.
That didn’t stop him from making his case after training today: “My shoulder is 110 percent. I feel 100 percent ready physically. I’m a hundred percent mentally. I’m ready to lead back there and be on the field. I’m just pushing these guys to get me cleared.”
Asked if he was going to see the doctors this week, Hamid said, “From what I know right now, I’m not a hundred percent clear yet, and I don’t know why. I know the whole thing bothers my mind at this point, and it’s really frustrating sitting here telling everybody that I’m ready and proving it on the field and not getting a chance on the field.”
Hamid, 20, has always had in his mind that he’d be United’s starting keeper this season, whether it was Troy Perkins, Steve Cronin or Pat Onstad that he had to beat out. Asked what it would take for him to be game-ready:
“I’m going to be completely honest with you,” said Hamid. “Watching myself play, knowing myself from last year, how I was playing at my peak, throughout that year and looking at myself now, what I’ve been able to do, I feel like I’m already ready, already there at that point. All it takes is a good two weeks of solid training, and we’ve had a good four weeks of two-a-days. So that’s been a lot of time to focus and pipe down on what I need to do, and that’s what I’ve done. At this point, I feel like I’m 110 percent ready to be on that field March 19.”
Meanwhile, Onstad is the guy on the field and in the net even right now though he maintains that he wasn’t sold right away on the idea of coming out of retirement.
“It’s been tough because I really didn’t know if I wanted to do this right up until the Chivas game,” said Onstad. “The morning of that game, I was actually really nervous, and I had butterflies and stuff as the game started. I was excited, and I really enjoyed myself out there. That’s one of the first times where I kind of said, if I keep concentrating, keep moving in the right direction, I can do this again so. It’s a huge challenge, and obviously, it’s something that was not planned. But at this stage, with Bill’s shoulder and Steve’s wrist, we’re kind of left with very few options.”
At 43 years old, Onstad clearly knows what it takes to get his body ready, and he said he’s behind the eight-ball in that department. But his bigger challenge might be handling the transition from coaching a determined young player like Hamid, to being his teammate and the starter in front of him, to eventually returning to that coaching role again.
“That’s difficult,” said Onstad. “That’s probably the most difficult one, is dealing with Bill and his psyche. I think the unfortunate thing for Bill is we thought coming to Charleston, he’d be all in, and unfortunately, it doesn’t look like it’ll be that way. He’s not far off. He’s been doing a lot of drills. He’ll be sharp, and as soon as he gets clearance from the doctor, I think he’ll be ready to play.”
*Other absences and injuries from Tuesday’s training session: Charlie Davies went back to France for a couple days to get his stuff packed up. He’s expected back in D.C. on Wednesday night. The team leaves early Thursday for Charleston. Junior Carreiro (ankle sprain) and Devon McTavish (concussion symptoms) didn’t practice while Cronin did some jogging and very light kicking around.
*D.C. United signed defender Chris Korb, who the team selected with the 31st overall pick in January’s draft. Ironically, Korb had to leave practice early on Tuesday because he was ill.
