Davies didn't have the traditional start to his football career. He didn't play under-18 football - he opted to solely play school football for Xavier College. Assistant coach Robert Shaw said Davies lack of match conditioning in his junior days has definitely made him a longer-term prospect. ""This is his third year at the club and because he didn't play under-18 footy you can basically say that his first year at the club was an under-19 year. His second year became a little bit of seniors but mainly seconds and this season should be the year where he makes his move into the seniors. You have to remember that James probably only played 12 games a year before coming to Essendon. Other junior players probably played twice as much footy as him - under-18s, Teal Cup and school footy,” Shaw said.
The Essendon selection committee has continued its selection policy of rotating the younger listed players through the seniors. ""James' form has been very encouraging and his improvement has been steady - but the fact is we have to give as many of our young listed players games. You don't want to get to a finals series or towards the end of the year and be thinking - I wish we had played him. We have to find out what these guys are capable of. It might be two to three weeks of Bannister - if he holds his form well and good, if he doesn't then we look at someone else. Basically it is a selection policy - there are a couple of spots available due to injuries and we would be negligent in our duty if we did not expose as many young players to senior football as is possible.""
Davies had a hand injury at the start of the season that sidelined him for the first two VFL games. Since returning he has been a key contributor to the Bendigo Bombers side and played predominantly at half back, wing and a little bit on the ball. ""My major strength to my game is my speed and fitness. I have been spending a bit of time in the mid-field this season and I think my fitness is the best it has ever been,"" Davies said.
Davies played for the Bendigo Bombers last Sunday against Coburg and didn't train with the senior team on Monday afternoon. ""I did recovery work on Monday afternoon with the other guys who played VFL. We had a pretty light training session because we had played on the previous day. The entire squad then trained together for the main skills session on Wednesday afternoon at Windy Hill."" Davies had no indication he was in the mix for senior selection until Kevin Sheedy announced his name in Thursday's team meeting. ""I was a bit surprised that I was selected because I didn't even train with the senior group on Monday night. However I am extremely pleased to get an opportunity and really looking forward to playing against Hawthorn,"" Davies said.
Shaw has been please with Davies form in the VFL side and said the former Xavier College student has done a lot of work over the pre season to improve his fitness so he can run out a game in the mid-field. ""James is a running player. He is very quick and has done a very good pre season. One of his problems in his early development is he is a burst player and a speed player - he has worked very hard in the mid-field pre season group and done a lot of aerobic running. That is one area we looked at where he had to improve significantly and he had done that - he has worked very hard,"" said Shaw
