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Interesting Article about Ron Davies


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http://www.abqjournal.com/sports/0701726sports02-07-09.htm

 

Ex-English Star Parked in Duke City Mobile Home Park

 

By Toby Smith

Journal Staff Writer

The gawky man is standing amid a seen-better-days East Central Avenue mobile home park.

"Have a throw, mate," the man calls to a reporter who is about 10 feet away, holding a soccer ball.

The reporter underhands a gentle toss, about nose high. As the ball approaches, the man leans forward and, bending slightly, meets it with his forehead. With a whomping sound, the ball comes back at five times the speed it went out.

"Again," the man says. Once more the ball returns hard and straight as a string. Then a third and a fourth time. Each one stings the reporter's hands.

"Like snapping your wrist," the man says indicating the movement of his head and neck. The reporter long believed headers in soccer meant taking balls anywhere on the skull. "Not if you're a striker," says the man, who was. "The ball goes right here." He points to a spot just above his beetlelike brows.

It's got to help, the reporter muses, to have a strong neck, which the man clearly does.

"Never be able to hang meself," he says laughing. "Just be dangling, alive."

The neck, the head, the snap. All combined to make the man a marvel, first in soccer-mad England, then later in the United States, during the dawn of pro soccer here.

Once upon a time Ron Davies drove a Jaguar, employed a maid and signed autographs until his fingers hurt. Now 66, Davies owns no car, lives in an aging RV with his wife and two cats, and it's his hip that pains him these days.

Neither Davies nor his wife, Chris, work, though each take pains to point out that their life is not of want. Davies gets Social Secuity from the U.S. and England and his wife says she has a small pension. They choose to reside in a 40-foot Winnebago, in a scruffy trailer park because, they say, they like the place and have friends here. And besides, they add, if only to bring more confusion, they're not going to stay here forever.

They settled in Albuquerque five years ago. Ron Davies did some construction work until his hips started killing him — arthritis from soccer, he says. Last year he had a hip replaced in Albuquerque and he'll have the other done this month. The surgeries, Davies says, were paid by an indigent health insurance offered by UNMH.

"Your country," he tells the reporter, "takes lovely care of its elderly.''

Tucked away inside the RV lie some yellowed clippings. The items are the only evidence of his prowess — until you get him outside to head a soccer ball toward a pretend goal.

Playing striker, chiefly for the Southampton Football Club, in Great Britain's highest division, Davies scored a remarkable 153 goals in 277 appearances, from 1966-1973.

By comparison, think of a baseball player hitting a home run in nearly every other game for eight years. Which is one reason why some comparisons make no sense.

Thus, think of Davies' stats this way: He did it sans sterioids. "Just me feet and head."

Ah, that cranium. More than half his goals, he says, came off his noggin.

"I would be at the post," he remembers. "We had wingers could split a sixpence on a cross. I could hang in the air like your Michael Jordan ."

Whomp. G-O-A-LLLLLLL!

Being tall helped. He was 6-foot-1, rare for a Welshman. "The Welsh are small, miserable people," he says laughing. "Big Ron," the fans called him.

He drove the Southhampton faithful crackers. "Give it to Ron!'' they chanted, a refrain 40 years later that is recalled fondly along England's southern coast. Indeed, Southampton supporters recently raised almost $10,000 for Big Ron to get some needed dental care.

The height of his career came on an August afternoon in 1969, in a match that is still talked of in breathless tones. Southampton traveled upland that day, to face mighty Manchester United, the New York Yankees of soccerdom.

"They had won the European Championships the year before," Davies says. "I think they took us too bloody lightly."

The result? A stunning blowout: Southampton 4, United 1.

More astonishing was that Ron Davies scored all four of his club's goals.

Using a baseball comparison again, his is a feat far greater than hitting four home runs in a game. Simply, goals are rare as unicorns in a match at that level, particularly if they come against powerful Man U and their then-superstar, George Best.

Davies left Southampton in 1974 in a trade with United, but that stay ended quickly. Injuries had already set in. He played for smaller clubs in England and then in South Africa. In 1977, on George Best's recommendation, Davies came to the United States, to compete in the new North American Soccer League, for the Los Angeles Aztecs.

He played in L.A. for three years, then in Tulsa and Seattle for a year. By 1980, he was out of the game and coaching high school soccer and tutoring kids on the side.

He'd like to coach privately in Albuquerque, after his hip surgery.

"If a child has no talent, I'll tell the parents so straightaway. Only way to do it."

He should be coaching, says Pete Clinch, a Brit who played back home and has coached elite players in Albuquerque for 30 years. "He is truly one of the prolific goal scorers."

Davies met his wife in 1981, in a suburban Los Angeles bar.

"I didn't understand a thing he said," Chris Davies says. Nor did she understand soccer. But she liked this Welshman with the funny accent.

"He made me laugh, he joked about everything. If I came from a beauty parlor with my hair curly, he said, 'Sorry you got electrocuted.'"

They have spent 24 years together, bouncing about the country.

When asked about the couple, Stefan Klimaj, an RV neighbor who runs errands for the Davieses, shrugs and says, "They're like lots of others. They do what they can."

But mostly they do it unrecognized, unnoticed. That is until Big Ron Davies hits a soccer ball with his head toward a goal that does not exist.

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A good read that. It's such a shame he's fallen on hard times.

 

 

Agree with you Stanley...but life is as it is, and there are many other fine former players who have also fallen on hard times.

Of course there was only ONE Ron Davies. I can already hear some younger fans complaining.....

...."oh they're not going on about that Davies fella' again ! "

Sorry, but I hope I never forget him. He really was the best header of a ball I've ever seen, and not to say he couldn't score with his feet either. Although fans at the time always seemed to say in total astonishment " Ron scored .....with his FEET! "

What a shame there is so little film of him in action. By the time we had televised games with video (1970) he was already past his best and suffering with injuries, especially as some defenders were really brutal with him (often OFF the ball, too )

 

That Man.U game was a classic of course. But I recall seeing him play an end of season game v Aston Villa at the Dell.

Villa were relegated that year (don't times change?) and we won 6-2. Ron scored 4 (2 headers + 2 with his feet) including a great angled shot when he beat the whole Villa defence, PLUS he also hit a post ..and had another goal disallowed - although only he ref. knew why ?? He could put away a mean penalty kick too, not always slamming it in..

but placing the ball, the way MLT always seemed to do.

 

Sounds like he's going to end up like the $6 million man..all repairs and replacements..if he was playing today ...his transfer fee would be enormous. Really nice memories. Good luck Ron !

Edited by david in sweden
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Agree with you Stanley...but life is as it is, and there are many other fine former players who have also fallen on hard times.

Of course there was only ONE Ron Davies. I can already hear some younger fans complaining.....

...."oh they're not going on about that Davies fella' again ! "

 

 

Don't forget, there were actually two..! And they both played for Saints in the 1960's. ;)

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Ron scored the winner the very first time I went to the Dell - a typical rocket header - something that will remain with me forever.

 

Thanks Ron and thanks exit for posting the article. I'm glad to hear he still seems happy, I don't think many of today's prima donnas would deal with reduced circumstances with such grace and good humour.

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Ron scored the winner the very first time I went to the Dell - a typical rocket header - something that will remain with me forever.

 

Thanks Ron and thanks exit for posting the article. I'm glad to hear he still seems happy, I don't think many of today's prima donnas would deal with reduced circumstances with such grace and good humour.

 

Right from the first match I attended, I used to get behind one of the goals. For the first season at the Archers End, mainly because I was in fear and awe of the Milton Mob; then thereafter at the Milton. Because I was so close to the goalmouth, I'll always remember the sound that Ron's head made on the ball. A real thud of head on leather. It inspired me to head the ball a bit more when the opportunities arose when I played for my school team. Didn't 'alf hurt sometimes, but I always tried to turn away, post header, like Ron might have.

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Ron scored the winner the very first time I went to the Dell - a typical rocket header - something that will remain with me forever.

 

Thanks Ron and thanks exit for posting the article. I'm glad to hear he still seems happy, I don't think many of today's prima donnas would deal with reduced circumstances with such grace and good humour.

 

Indeed! I can just imagine some of them claiming that it 'was some other barstewards fault!'.

 

Any updates on Ron, post op?

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Indeed! I can just imagine some of them claiming that it 'was some other barstewards fault!'.

 

Any updates on Ron, post op?

 

 

Firsty, gotta say that Ron and especially Chris ain't too chuffed with the way that they were portrayed in this article... :-(

 

Ron is recovering great, however Chris has a bad case of the flu so the physical therapist cannot visit for a few days. Ron is sore and strong pride only allows him to take pain killers if absolutely needed.

 

He is thrilled to bits with all the e-mail 'get-wells' and then talked to me of other things today.

 

He turned the topic to when he was with 'Awwy Wednapp, Bobby Howe and Jimmy Gabriel at Seattle. He feft 'Awwy was a nice enough bloke and a pretty quiet guy to be fair. He also tried to recall the 'Hamwih' story from another thread and still to this day can't see what was wrong with him (at the height of his powers) turning out for some random pub team FAF

 

Andy and everyone else...our boy is doing well, he was the happiest that I've heard him for ages and he is always pretty happy.

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