By Keiran Gorsky
How do we know Jonathan David was there? Sometimes it seems like he disappeared without a trace.
It’s the great crime of quiet people who have the gall to become famous – they don’t leave a paper trail. And their living historians, those organic primary sources, treasure and shield what knowledge they have.
The best evidence for their existence is those who come to know their shadows – who see their murals on the wall and internalize every tidbit of biography. They know Jonathan David walked through these halls and cast his shadow in this dimly lit dome because they felt him there every day.
For students at Louis-Riel high school, David is a blueprint and an all-purpose parable. Here was living proof that the journey to the heavens could twist and turn and even start in Ottawa. The most mundane and practical advice from Louis-Riel coach and program director Joé Fournier was instantly inspiring so long as David could serve as a reference point.
“I would talk to my coach, trying to find out what different things he (David) used to do in the mornings,” recalls Olivier Roy, who graduated from Louis-Riel last year. “He would go before school and started to train. So me and a couple of my friends started doing that just to give us that little more of an inch of a chance to succeed.”
Fournier made a point of decorating the dome with images and memorabilia of professional footballers who passed through the school. A signed David jersey from his abbreviated stint with Canadian youth teams, delivered by the Iceman personally, makes for a priceless item in the collection.
In praise of the little things, David seemed always to be watching from the wall. The vague recollections of teachers at Louis-Riel who, on the whole, never really got a good sense of the quiet boy, only added to his mystique. It seemed a blessing to touch the same turf that he did.
“I think that’s why it kind of creates hope, because it shows you that you’re in the same spot as a pro player,” says fellow graduate Nathan Aquilina, who now plays for the University of Victoria Vikes. “And if he did it, what is stopping you from maybe continuing to improve in those environments and reaching the next level?”
And, of course, there are the sightings, narrated all like ghost stories. Now a student-athlete at Université de Moncton, Roy was rewarded for his early mornings one Thursday at Millennium Park.
“I just randomly went to the field and I saw him there,” Roy remembers of the day David, true to form, got some extra training in while no one was watching during a visit back home.
Maybe the former Gloucester Hornets/Ottawa Internationals player has won the right to his outer shell. Roy and his friends spoke with David, but only briefly.
“We didn’t want to take too much time out of his day, so we just got a couple of words with him,” Roy recounts. “He wanted to know about our school, about how we’re doing and about what are the next steps that we’re trying to reach. It was just having a conversation like anybody else.”
Canada comes back for first men’s World Cup point, David subbed out at hour mark
Perhaps on account of his quiet year at Juventus, Toronto’s Exhibition Place wasn’t so decorated with David kits as you might expect at Canada’s FIFA men’s World Cup opener. Though David was far and away the highest profile player in the 11, it was the injured Alphonso Davies who still dominated jerseys on the backs of fans.
Working off an admittedly small sample size, those bold enough to back the Juventus talisman were some of his most ardent defenders.
“I just love how he’s this little guy who just sneaks through the defence and scores goals,” said one fan. “He’s our kind of guy, and he’s been a little bit snakebitten recently, but I’m hoping this will be a breakout game for him.”
Unfortunately for the capacity Canadian crowd, Friday afternoon’s David looked much the same as the one from pre-World Cup friendlies against Uzbekistan and Ireland. Paired with a somewhat unfamiliar strike partner in Villarreal’s Tani Oluwaseyi, David struggled to find his rhythm in a hard-fought 1-1 draw with Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The 26-year-old seemed to tread middle ground between his usual linkup-man deployment under Team Canada head coach Jesse Marsch and his poacher’s instincts. David managed just 24 touches, the fewest of any in the 11, before he was subbed out in the 61st minute.
David did get one of Canada’s best chances of the match in the 17th minute. Alistair Johnston’s cross hit a Bosnian defender and settled calmly into David’s path near the penalty spot. His strike was powerful, but poorly placed, rolling right into the waiting arms of goalkeeper Nikola Vasilj.
“Johnny didn’t have his best day. It’s normal that a player doesn’t always play at his peak, but he’s an incredibly important player for us,” Marsch said after the game. “We’ll need him in this tournament to be at his best and find a way to use this experience to be better for the next one, because without him in top form, we’re not the same team that we have potential to be.”
“Given performances from some of our front players and given the weapons that we had on the bench, I wanted to make some changes, and I wanted to bring in some guys that I thought could bring in a little bit more energy.”
Substitute Cyle Larin, Canada’s #2 all-time leading scorer behind David, tied the game in the 78th minute as the Canadians earned their first-ever point at a men’s World Cup.
Canada plays next against Qatar on Thursday in Vancouver.