New England Soccer Today

Davies Talks ‘Perfect Situation’ With Revs

FOXBOROUGH, Mass. – Charlie Davies made it no secret how excited he is to join the club he grew up supporting from his hometown of Manchester, New Hampshire.

“It’s amazing to be back here,” said Davies. “Especially in the middle of the season where the team is making a playoff push and I’m happy to be apart of that and try and help the team get into the playoffs. I’ve grown up in this area and I’ve watched the Revolution play since the first year they started playing here. Its always been a dream of mine as a little kid to finally play professional in your home town so I’m really excited.”

Davies was acquired by the Revolution last week on loan from Randers FC and the 27-year-old forward participated in his first training in his #99 New England jersey on Tuesday morning. The excitement feeling is mutual between Davies and his new club.

“I think it’s important that on this one it was both club and player that were excited about the opportunity,” said Revolution head coach Jay Heaps. “Charlie is from the area and there’s been times when we’ve talked about bringing him back but it had to be all aligned and I think the timing was right and the situation was right.”

Davies was unable to score in 23 appearances in the Danish SuperLiga but is returning to an area where he’s had plenty of success in the past. He scored 24 goals and tallied 11 assists in three years at Boston College before foregoing his senior season and the MLS Draft for Europe. He believes his experiences is something that can help the Revolution.

“Playing at high levels in Europe and with the National Team,” Davies said of his experience. “With me being a striker, my pace and definitely goal scoring. I’m just looking to help out anyway I can. I know they’re playing a 4-3-3 so playing in any one of those three forward positions and just helping the team doing what I do best which is causing trouble for the defenses and scoring goals.”

Davies said he found out about the possible move about two weeks ago and said the move sounded like ” a no-brain.” He also called playing for New England as a “perfect situation” on multiple occasions. He also said the opportunity of playing time was a factor in his decision.

“Of course, who doesn’t want to play?” Davies said. “I think what makes it perfect is my skill set really will help this team benefit on the field especially for the remainder of the season. I feel like I’m coming in fresh and its midseason a lot of these guys are starting to get tired and I’m a little injection of energy and a boost of morale in the locker room because I think I’m a great guy in the locker room to have around, at least I think so. And I know most of the guys on the team. It’s gone smoothly and I think it will continue to go smoothly.”

The addition of Davies to an already competitive forward core that includes Juan Agudelo, Chad Barrett, Jerry Bengtson, Saer Sene, Diego Fagundez, and Dimitry Imbongo is going to create an even more competitive environment, something Heaps has preached since day one.

“I think he’s different than the other guys we have so there’s that opportunity,” Heaps said. “And where we’re trying to get our team, we’ve talked about it from day one and that’s competition, and he brings that. He’s going to be able to elevate the players around him just by being present and just by scoring goals in training. Guys start to work a little harder after training to continue to keep their time on the field and I like that. I like it when it’s a constructive competitive environment.”

Davies is looking forward to the challenge of the competition on the team and with other teams in the league. He scored 11 goals for DC United in the 2011 season and is looking to prove that he has improved his game.

“That’s another reason I wanted to come here is to come back to the United States and prove, not only have I gotten much better since I last played here with DC United, I really feel like its time to come back here and show people ‘I’m not hiding. I haven’t gone away. I still think I have a lot to offer. I want to continue to get better,’ so this was the perfect place for me to come,” he said.

As for this Saturday, Heaps has a vacant spot to fill in one of his forward positions as Imbongo will be serving a suspension and he didn’t rule out the possibility of Davies appearing.

“I think he’s getting there,” Heaps said after Davies’ first training. “In terms of full match fitness, there’s a ways to go with that because you have to be reasonable to what he was doing before he got here. But he’ll have a good week of training with us and we’ll be able to assess him. The progression is to get him playing more this week and make a decision on Friday on how many minutes he can play on Saturday if it’s 90, 60, 30 – I think we’re talking those lower numbers but he’s been going through a full fitness in preseason so his numbers look good. We just need to get him up to speed with what we’re doing.”

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