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Washington Redskins quarterback Mark Brunell, who missed practices on Wednesday and Thursday because of an elbow injury, returned to the field Friday and was cleared to start in Sunday's game against the Jacksonville Jaguars.

Brunell

Brunell is coming off one of the best performances of his tenure in Washington, setting a league record by completing his first 22 passes in last Sunday's win over Houston.

The 14-year veteran suffered a lacerated left elbow in that game. Given his past problems with such injuries, Washington coaches exercised caution this week in holding him out of practice for two days. The elbow laceration required three stitches to close and Redskins trainers treated it diligently to avoid the possibility of infection.

In 2003, while playing for the Jaguars, Brunell suffered a similar injury in the third game of the year. He developed an infection in the elbow, missed several weeks of play, and never regained his starting job from his injury replacement, Byron Leftwich.

Jacksonville traded Brunell to Washington the following spring. Brunell, 36, who played nine seasons with the Jaguars and had his greatest success there, has not missed a game because of injury since joining the Redskins in 2004.

Although he did not practice Thursday, Brunell did throw on the sidelines and reported that the elbow was much improved. He then participated fully on Friday in the final prep session for Sunday's game. A bandage still covered Brunell's left arm, but it was far less cumbersome than the wrap he had worn earlier in the week.

From the outset, the Washington coaching staff felt that Brunell would play this week, and the offensive game plan was installed with his participation in mind. The staff has little faith in either of the backups, Todd Collins and Jason Campbell, and Brunell will have to suffer a much more severe injury to get one of them on the field.

Although he struggled in the first two games of the season, both losses, Brunell threw the ball extremely well last week. The Redskins hope that is a sign that he and the rest of the offense are finally assimilated to the design new coordinator Al Saunders installed this spring and summer.

For the season, Brunell has completed 59 of 88 passes for 621 yards, with one touchdown pass, one interception and a passer rating of 86.4.

While Brunell will play, starting cornerback Shawn Springs will miss a fourth straight game as he continues to recover from preseason abdominal surgery. Springs visited this week with the specialist who performed his surgery, but was not cleared to play.

Springs was making good progress before a setback last week. There is still no timetable for Springs' return to the lineup.

Len Pasquarelli is a senior NFL writer for ESPN.com. To check out Len's chat archive, click here .