2014 World Cup: America's star Donovan confident USA will triumph in Group of Death

Published on: 19 April 2014
2014 World Cup: America's star Donovan confident USA will triumph in Group of Death
Landon Donovan says America will progress from the Group of Death

America star player Landon Donovan says they will progress from their group with Ghana at the World Cup in Brazil in June despite being rated as the Group of Death.

The Americans have drawn Germany, Portugal and Ghana in Brazil, but the LA Galaxy man says that Jurgen Klinsmann's men have the ability to progress to the knockout stages

Indeed, Donovan's primary focus is on helping the US surviving the World Cup's 'group of death' in Brazil this summer.

Given their respective Fifa world rankings, the Americans (13th) have been placed in the tournament's toughest pool, as they will have to face Germany (2nd), Portugal (3rd) and Ghana (38th).

However, Donovan claims that while such a group would have once left the US feeling that they had no chance of progressing, Jurgen Klinsmann's current squad believe themselves more than capable of reaching the last 16.

"If you play three very good games chances are you're going to advance," the former Bayer Leverkusen and Bayern Munich man reasoned.

"We couldn’t always say that about our team in the past because we just weren’t talented or experienced enough, but now we can say that.

"We think that if we play three very good games - and maybe when you have three difficult teams like this you have to play three very, very good games - but we think we’re capable of that, and if we do that, we think we’ll advance."

Donovan knows that he is unlikely to feature in a fifth World Cup but he insists that he has no plans to hang up his boots just yet.

"I can see the finish line, just not super clearly, so I don't know when it will be," he revealed.

"I'm enjoying myself now, and as long as I keep enjoying myself I'll keep playing. If I get to the point where I’m not, then I won't, and that’s sort of the way I’ve always approached it, but now it’s in a more immediate way.

"I'm going to do my best to take advantage of all these opportunities and make the most of them, because once it's done, it’s done, and then I'll be moving on to other things."

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