Former U.S. Men's National Team captain Landon Donovan will be playing before a crowd of 3,000 when the LA Galaxy play the Carolina RailHawks of the North American Soccer League in the fifth round of the U.S. Open Cup on Tuesday night, far from the spotlight of the World Cup.
Yahoo! Sports is reporting that the game will be held at the Koka Booth Stadium in Cary, North Carolina, the secondary facility of the RailHawks and which pales in comparison to the Arena da Amazonia in Manaus, Brazil where the U.S. takes on Portugal in a crucial Group D match-up on Sunday.
LA Galaxy will be bannered by Donovan and Irish forward Robbie Keane.
"We are all expecting to play in this game," Donovan told LAGalaxy.com as quoted by Yahoo! Sports. "We're sick of losing to Carolina and we're sick of going out of the Open Cup early. Also we don't have any MLS games during this break so we need it for fitness. We're excited for it and I've said to [Galaxy coach Bruce Arena] early on that I want to play as much as possible in this tournament."
Donovan may have been snubbed by US coach Jurgen Klinnsman, but RailHawks president Curt Johnson says he believes that striker will be received well by the home team. "(Landon) is one of the best players to ever put on a MLS/US Soccer uniform and we all have a tremendous respect for his career to date and what he has meant to soccer in general in the United States," Johnson said. "I suspect many fans will use it as a time to salute him [and I support that] and once the game starts everyone will focus on the result."
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