Landon Donovan starts against Mexico with an eye infection, scores anyway

Proving his commitment to the U.S. team after his sabbatical earlier in the year, Landon Donovan started Tuesday night's mega-hyped World Cup qualifier against Mexico with a fairly nasty looking eye infection. According to ESPN's Roger Bennett, Donovan shied away from TV cameras the day before the match, presumably to keep from scaring the children.

After losing Michael Bradley to injury and Jozy Altidore, Geoff Cameron and Matt Besler to yellow card suspensions before/during last Friday's 3-1 loss to Costa Rica, the U.S. couldn't afford to be without anymore key players. So, Donovan and his gunky eyeball had to play on. It remains unclear how he contracted the eye infection, though. But anyone who has seen Knocked Up knows how that sort of thing usually happens.

We'll see if the fear of it being contagious helps him cut through the Mexican defense.

UPDATE: Apparently it did. Donovan scored in the 78th minute to make it 2-0.