Landon Donovan Is Ready
October 27, 2008As the MLS season closes, Landon Donovan is wasting no time clarifying his desire to try his hand at European soccer. ESPN has a piece today about Landon’s potential future abroad, and here’s the important stuff:
”Competitively I have that itch and I want to go and I will make that very clear to people.”
Donovan said he would approach MLS officials this week to request a move and added that he had told Galaxy head coach Bruce Arena of his wish to join a European club.
”I think the League is aware of my situation and I’ve had brief talks with Bruce about it and let him know, but it’s still early.
”There can be a lot of fluctuation between now and January 1. Teams that are in trouble might be playing great by then and vice versa. Injuries happen and we’ll see where we’re at.”
My Thoughts: Kudos to Donovan for finally sacking up taking on the big leagues. Hopefully he can land at a strong club and doesn’t end up at West Brom, or Newcastle (yuck). Even worse, I hope Fulham doesn’t try and buy him. Our American stars need to diversify their European destinations. I would be intrigued to see Donovan in La Liga as I think his game is well suited to Spain, but I also wouldn’t be upset if he did indeed end up at Bayern Munich. We’ll see if Klinsmann is still high on Landon in a month or two.
In all, any move to a more competitive league will only help our USMNT as well. This is a chance for Landon to truly take his game to the next level. Whether you love him or hate him, the truth is that Donovan is the best USMNT player of the last 8 years. If he can elevate his game even more, then he could become an even better threat at the National level. Granted, I’m going to remain cynical, because there’s also a strong chance that Landon just ends up as a bench player in a Euro league, and we already have plenty of those. I’d rather be pessmistic and then pleasantly surprised, as opposed to expect the world and then be disappointed.
Where do you think he’ll end up? Germany? England? Spain?
–psc
Yanked Around 
I think he’ll go to Spain. He speaks Spanish. Bianca probably would prefer that country vs Germany or England due to weather and climate. Germany I think he should just move past it. And England – I think it might be too risky for him to fail there. Q though……so I guess Bianaca’s TV show is done after this season? Cause I can’t foresee him going anywhere if she isn’t attached to his hip – especially as that is why he has been so anal about his past 6 years in LA. There is no way he could handle her shooting her show in LA while he is on a different continent. I have yet to see anything about her show being cancelled though.
I don’t think Bianca’s show is over. It just was bought to go into syndication for like 400 million dollars. Plus, even if it was done, I don’t think she would be joining him in Europe after finally carving a career for herself. Instead I think that Landon is finally mature enough to accept the personal sacrifices that might come with wanting to play at the highest level possible. But you do raise an interesting question: what does Bianca think of all this?