So this should be obvious
but having mentioned Bradley, there was a moment late in the game when the midfielder showed great awareness to misdirect the Honduran defense and pick out Graham Zusi out wide, only for the Sporting Kansas City player to fail to control it and see the chance disappear before he could get a dangerous cross in.
Now Zusi is a young player with a bright future, an assured touch (usually), and with the departure of his team mate Kei Kamara to Norwich, may even have been given a short term opportunity to develop at club level in the position most often occupied by Landon Donovan in the national side. But at that moment, with the US desperately needing a goal, he was Not-Donovan. Donovan was missed against Honduras. Where Bradley brings the ability to drive the tempo of a game and Dempsey brings touch, determination and invention, Donovan, the third member of the team's world class outfield trio, at his best marries both these qualities and can help mask the inefficiencies of the midfield around him (which can at times resemble an array of square pegs tapped into round holes that keep changing position).
The LA Galaxy man is still on his sabbatical and that is his prerogative. There's a certain argument that Klinsmann might be best served by letting the midfielder see out that sabbatical and let it become a de facto permanent leave of absence from the US team. Not to punish the player for "abandoning" his side, but to preserve the integrity and chemistry of what would hopefully be a team that had found a way to win without him. Yet it's an argument that depends on the team having shown it has found those ways to win, rather than floundering. As things stand, if and when Donovan does come back he's still one of the few players who can change an international game that Klinsmann has at his disposal - for now the US team still needs him.
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