Davie Selke complete the full 90 minutes against FC Augsburg and is now officially back on the Weser. The 25-year-old’s return to Osterdeich is very much a matter of the heart. As soon as the doors opened for his return to Bremen, he was full of excitement. “Werder’s a special club for me. I had other options, but I consciously chose to come to Werder,” Selke explained on Sunday morning.
Davie Selke is the typical number nine; tall, tough and with an eye for goal. Shortly before Werder opened the scoring in Augsburg, he proved his quality both with and without the ball as he was denied by Augsburg stopper Luthe. It’s exactly such things that he wants to produce more of in the future. “I want to make life difficult for the opposition and be a presence in the box”, the big striker said.
It’s only logical that some interplay with his teammates didn’t quite come off, especially after just one training session. This will change, of course. In time, Selke won’t just get to know his teammates better, but they him as well. “We need learn how each other move and commit this to memory,” the striker encouraged. He’s optimistic; “we’ve got the quality to put balls into the box, you could see that with Nuri Sahin’s pass.”
While very few people still remain from Selke’s first stint at the club, one very important figure is still around. Head coach Florian Kohfeldt was already a member of Bremen’s coaching staff when Selke made his first appearances in the Bundesliga. “We understand one another really well and have kept in touch. He was already a good coach and trained us well back then,” said Selke about his new boss.
However, Werder’s head coach wasn’t the deciding factor in his decision to make the switch to his old club. “Florian didn’t have to convince me, it was all about whether the switch was doable or not,” Selke described the transfer negotiations between SV Werder and his former club, Hertha BSC. After the first contact was made, it all went rather quickly. “We had some long, intense discussions over the course of two days. I’ve never been on the phone so often in my life.” After a bit of a ‘tug-of-war’, Selke is grateful to now be able to play in front of the Werder fans again, even if Borussia Dortmund are next up.
“With the fans behind us, anything is possible on Tuesday. You can also gain a lot of confidence from the DFB-Pokal.” Selke knows the feeling of facing BVB in the Green-and-White. Almost five years ago to the day, Selke scored once and assisted another to win the match on the Weser. Maybe he’ll do the same on Tuesday night...
