It was the debut he never expected. Landon Donovan was parked on the bench at the Los Angeles Coliseum 25 years ago today, watching USA take on rivals Mexico in a friendly, thinking he would never play. But circumstances changed and suddenly he was on, and for nearly a decade-and-a-half, he hardly ever came off.
Not only did USA’s joint-top goalscorer debut that night, but he scored the first of his 57 first international goals, while starting a trend of tormenting his rivals to the south. It was also the continuation of the promise Donovan had shown a year prior at the FIFA U-17 World Cup™ in New Zealand when he led USA to a semi-final finish – their best to date – and collected the adidas Golden Ball.
In light of his US national team silver anniversary and the upcoming FIFA U-17 World Cup Qatar 2025™, FIFA took a stroll down Memory Lane with the 43-year-old to get his recollections of his “chaotic” debut, the joy of playing with the U-17s and his excitement for Mauricio Pochettino’s USA team at the FIFA World Cup 26™.
Landon Donovan: That’s significantly more than half my life ago. It’s incredible to think that it’s been that long.
I was at [Bayer] Leverkusen and things were going OK, but it wasn’t anywhere on my radar to be going into the national team. My agent, Richard Motzkin, called one day and, unbeknownst to me, he had been working behind the scenes talking to [head coach] Bruce [Arena] and saying, ‘Bruce, you need to bring this guy in and have a look at him.’
Bruce agreed to bring me in. I don’t remember anything about the camp, but I do remember before the game feeling a huge level of excitement. I had zero expectation of playing, so much so that when Chris Henderson got hurt, and Bruce walked down the bench and said, ‘Landon, start warming up,’ my shoes weren’t tied. I didn’t have my shin guards next to me, I don’t think my jersey was on, and I just really panicked [laughs]. As quickly as I could, I tried to warm up while tying my shoes, finding my shin guards and jersey. It was just chaotic.
To be honest, in all ways it was better. Because if you know you’re starting the night before the game, it’s a sleepless night. You’re excited. You wake up early. I thought I was there just as a number for training and to experience it. Even at the game, I thought I was there just to observe and take it in, and I had zero expectation to play. There was no time to think about it. I was just thrust into it.
Once I got into the game, my instincts just took over. It was just being young and dumb and not knowing what was going on. I was able to play freely, and I don’t remember if I played well or not. Obviously, scoring the goal and getting an assist was great, but other than that, I have no concept of whether I played well or didn’t. It was the first moment in my career where I realized the power of making a play. You can have a terrible game, but if you can make the play that makes the difference, then it’s a success.
So, I’m going make a comment that I promise you is not based on ego. There are certain people that when those moments come, or those games come, they’re better, and they play better, and they take advantage of the moment, and I was always like that.
A lot more now than it did then. Our motto from [head coach] John Ellinger was: ‘Respect everyone, fear no one’. On the surface, it’s kind of cheesy, but we really believed it. We would play MLS teams against grown men, and we thought we were going to win. We went to Argentina, beat Argentina. We played in tournaments all over Europe, in Austria and France, and we beat good teams. At that time, I think for our age, certainly DaMarcus [Beasley] and myself, we were some of the best players in the world.
That’s where stars are born… For most players at that time, that was where you were being scouted and seen. And not just by European teams, also by MLS teams, because they didn’t know a lot about us. It’s the first time you’re truly on the world stage in front of everyone. It’s an opportunity to really showcase yourself. Not only that, but it’s just so much fun as a player to get to compete at that level against the best young players in the world. It was some of the best moments of my life.
My goal against Australia is one of the better goals and one of the more memorable goals I ever scored. I think we were down 2-0 and I got a ball inside, took a touch and just ripped it into the far post with my left foot. It was such a big goal and an important goal to get us back in that game. Beating New Zealand at the death in the opener was really, really special too.
It will forever bond us. I don’t think there’s been a US group that had that many players that went on to play, not only in World Cups, but have meaningful professional careers too. It was a really special group. I give so much credit to John Ellinger and how he helped us develop at that age. It is a very formative time in your life, and having the right coach and the right people who are influencing you is vital. I’m not just talking from a soccer standpoint, I’m just saying in general, in life, and John was so great at that.
There’s nothing that would have ever compared. It’s part of the reason why some of us are so hard on this current group [of players]. We want them to really understand the opportunity that’s ahead of them. I’ve spoken a lot to Alexi [Lalas], to guys who played in ‘94 and what that did for their lives and their careers can’t be overstated. You just want to make sure that everybody involved is really taking advantage of this opportunity.
I can’t wait. My first ever World Cup game was Argentina-Romania at the Rose Bowl when I was 12 years old. I’ve not been to [Los Angeles Stadium] yet, but I’m so excited to go. I will of course be at both the first and third games there for the U.S. It’s going to be great. I’m really excited.
I think that the challenge is when you fire a coach and there’s only a year and change to the World Cup, you’re putting the new coach in a really tough spot, because you only have so much time. And it’s not like Mauricio has been in America for 20 years and knows the soccer landscape. It’s the opposite. His learning curve must be incredibly steep. He’s had the challenge of trying to build a team, but not really knowing any of the parts that well. He’s taken the approach of figuring out what ingredients he has before making the soup. It seems like now he understands about 95-plus per cent of what he has, and it’s time to start putting this group together.
