The back-and-forth between Landon Donovan and Jurgen Klinsmann took a strange new twist on Wednesday morning.
Appearing on the Soccer Morning show, ESPN analyst Alexi Lalas revealed that a U.S. Soccer source informed him that the US national team head coach did in fact call the retiring Donovan, the country's all-time leader in goals and assists, "about 10 days ago" to discuss plans for the Oct. 10 match, which is to be Donovan's farewell to the national team.
The same federation source also told Lalas that Jurgen Klinsmann's son, 18-year-old US youth international Jonathan Klinsmann, emailed Donovan to apologize for disrespectful comments made on Twitter when the US roster, which did not include Donovan, was announced for the 2014 FIFA World Cup.
As of Sept. 26, during an interview conducted with Grant Wahl of Sports Illustrated, Donovan indicated that he had no contact with Klinsmann or his son. At the time he was asked if he had spoken to Klinsmann about the Ecuador friendly.
"I did not," he responded.
Donovan was also asked if he had received an apology from Jonathan Klinsmann.
"I did not," he responded.
After Galaxy training on Tuesday, Donovan thanked US Soccer president Sunil Gulati for "making the effort to make this happen." And when asked if his final USMNT appearance would not have happened without Gulati's insistence, Donovan replied: “I don't know for sure, but I'd say that's a safe assumption.”
