Landon Donovan is Back, Driving Crazily and Teaching Kids Finance Through Soccer

Landon Donovan is back on American soil, ready to help lead Major League Soccer into a new era. Well, at the very least, he’s looking to keep the form he found at Everton and parlay that into success for LA Galaxy. And let’s be completely honest here, most American soccer fans wanted Donovan to stay in the Premiership to hone his skills in advance of this summer’s World Cup. Now that he’s back in the States, we’d prefer him encased in bubble wrap for a few months. And maybe someone else should drive him around for a while.⇥“It’s kind of weird when you’re driving, then all of a sudden you see someone coming right at you,” Donovan said. “It was actually interesting coming back here and driving for the first few times with people in the car and they were like, ‘What are you doing?’“During his stint at Everton, Donovan proved he can play – and thrive – at the highest levels of the international game. And it’s good, if you read his comments since coming back to America, that he still has a little chip on his shoulder.⇥“I don’t live under a rock – I’m not stupid. I know things that people say. I also understand when people say those things they have their own issues and there’s nothing you can do about it.⇥⇥“I’m not a revengeful person, a vindictive person. I think what was most important for me was to prove to myself I was capable of that. That was the most validating.”⇥

While he surely wants to stay in Europe to play soccer, Donovan is already re-acclimating himself to the Los Angeles area, teaming up with Visa to create a game called Financial Soccer. Note, do not click this link unless you have time to learn a lot about the American financial system. It’s intoxicating.

From PR Newswire:⇥Visa’s Financial Soccer is an educational video game that combines the world’s most popular sport with a high-quality financial literacy curriculum to create an innovative approach for helping children and adults learn about personal finance. In addition to helping create educational questions for the soccer-themed personal finance game, Donovan also appears on the game’s cover and website. ⇥⇥⇥A FIFA Partner since 2007, Visa has been working to roll out Financial Soccer in over 25 countries in the months leading up to the 2010 FIFA World Cup™. This multilingual game is available at www.financialsoccer.com. Financial Soccer is part of Practical Money Skills for Life, Visa’s free, award-winning, financial education program. The program contains comprehensive money management resources and lesson plans tailored for use at home and in the classroom.⇥

Donovan unveiled the game, which he reportedly helped develop, at Venice High School. Visa also donated computers for the kids to play the game and “for other academic uses.” And who knows, maybe Donovan employed the folks at Financial Soccer to help resolve the MLS labor dispute.↵