There wasn’t nearly enough space to hit all the signature quotes from yesterday’s Charlie Davies press conference at RFK Stadium. In my running around, I didn’t hear all of them, but this should be a good start:
Charlie Davies
On what he has to do, where is as a player: “The only effects from the injury is just the time off. When you spend over a year out of top-level games, it takes a little while to get back into it, not only just to play but to be back in form and be on these goal-scoring runs that strikers usually have. For me, I think it’s a little bit about everything, but I’m not too far off. With Ben as the coach, I think he’ll push me everywhere I need to be pushed and get back to where I want to be. It’s not just to get back to where I was. The goal is still to be better than I was before and still achieve all the goals I had before as a player.”
Asked if there’s one play, one move than can describe the difference between where he is now vs. what he’s trying to get back to: “It’s just when you’re out of competition at a high level for over a year, there are many different things. It’s timing. It’s confidence. I think those are two of the most important things at this moment, just timing and confidence, and you gotta get used to the new team and the adjustment of playing in MLS now. Those are the biggest things now, and of course, just simple technical things that are much different in training than they are in a match. Getting used to those little things and after preseason, I’ll be hopefully coming into MLS in full force.”
On how much of a difference it made to play so well in D.C.’s preseason matches in Florida: “You gotta come in, and you have to prove to your teammates that not only are you good, but you’re really going to help the team. For me it was really important to show the guys that I’m back, that I’m going to help this team win games. Have confidence in me, believe in me. Of course, there’ll be some difficult times, but as long as you have faith in me, we’ll make this work.”
On how long the process has taken since the accident: “The downs definitely outweighed the ups, just the little battles that I had. In training I would do one move and it’d feel like the old me, and that’s what kept me going, these little one minute moments, ten-second moments during a day that would keep me going. I’ll remember that for the rest of my life, and now that I’m back, you can’t forget those things, and I think I can help guys, be like, ‘You can’t complain now, listen to what I had to go through,’ and put things in perspective for a lot of the players.
“Moving from the hospital bed to the wheelchair to the crutches to walking, then to jogging on a treadmill. On each phase, I wanted to do more. I think always pushed myself to the limit. I think that’s one of the main things that really pushed me through. I think I came back too early to training in France, and I think I developed a lot of bad habits that for the past three or four months I’ve been breaking, and it’s just been very difficult.”
On first revisiting D.C. and the site of the accident: “It was two months later. I was with Oguchi Onyewu. We were in Delaware rehabbing with [U.S. national team trainer Jim] Hashimoto, and [Onyewu] is like, ‘I’m going to see my father,’ who’s staying in the same hospital that I was in, he had back surgery. He was like, ‘Do you want to come?’ I’m like, ‘Yeah, I want to.’ He’s like, ‘Do you want to drive down the GW Parkway?’ I was like, ‘Yeah, I do.’ And so he drove down and showed me it. I also went to the hospital where I was. As weird as it sounds, it was interesting for me to see all of it and from a different perspective, just to be so thankful for my life. I felt relieved after driving by the site of the accident.”
On his mindset change since the accident: “Every morning I wake up and I say a prayer, how thankful I am for another day. For me whenever I got out on the field, it’s like it’s been since I was seven years old. It’s been the same, doing the same things and feeling the same way. Its’ the sport I love. But I have that competitive nature where I want to be the best, and I want to do everything the best. I think that mentality will really help this team out.”
D.C. United head coach Ben Olsen
On Davies’ readiness: “What I didn’t know was where he was on the playing side. That we had to look at. Bringing in Charlie for preseason, he proved to us he’s on his way back to being the Charlie of old. Is he there yet? There’s still some rust, of being off that long and going through some of the things that he went through. Now our job, a job we’re looking forward to, is dusting that rust off and getting him back to the form that we saw several years ago.”
Was Olsen prepared to say no?: “Of course I was prepared to say no. This was a big piece for us. If it’s not a good piece, it’s not going to look good on me. We feel very, very comfortable with where Charlie’s at. Saying that, I’m also very comfortable with the forwards we have. We’re going to have four forwards on this team that could all potentially start. There’s some stuff that comes with having Charlie and, I think city’s going to embrace him, and I think people are very intrigued by this story and want to be a part of it, but Charlie’s here because he proved to me that he could play and help our team.”
On Davies’ attributes: “He’s a good kid, he’s a friendly kid, he’s a respectful kid. He works his tail off. He’s coachable. He has a certain way about him. If you’re around him, you like him. He’s a likeable kid, and I think people see that. But putting that aside, He’s fast. We can talk about that stuff, but I like the speed, too, and I like his ability to get behind defenses and be a nuisance on the field and be something we haven’t had for a couple years.”
On Davies’ stanky leg goal celebration dance: “I just hope to see it quite a bit this year. You score a goal, you can do whatever you want.”
D.C. United general manager Dave Kasper, on what to expect from Davies on the field this season: “Is he physically ready to start 30 games? I think in a month’s time, after preseason, I think the answer will probably be yes. But at the end of the day, will he get a starting job? That will be determined by him.
Is he physically ready. We believe so. We think he’s a got a little ways to go to get that final confidence, that final – to get to the top level. He’s very close, the time off is the reason why, it’s nothing to do with the physical nature. He’ll have that in a month’s time to start the season.”
