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Post by Soccerhouse on Aug 14, 2018 20:56:09 GMT -5
What do ya think? www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sports/sd-sp-us-soccer-pay-to-play-u20s-20180814-story.html“ Our fragile advantage in ‘athleticism’ will wilt in the face of intelligence,” Beane, a Dartmouth and Stanford alum with European perspective from his youth academy in Barcelona, wrote me on social media. “Until we abandon our arrogance and complacency based upon past success, we will not adequately prepare our young players for the future. We have a unique opportunity now on both the men’s and women’s side of U.S. Soccer to rethink and redesign talent development.”
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Post by 04gparent on Aug 15, 2018 7:56:23 GMT -5
Wow! Spot on... Thanks for sharing. The question is what can we do about it in our community?
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Post by atlsoccer on Aug 15, 2018 8:59:46 GMT -5
It is interesting that he compares the system to basketball, assuming basketball has the right model when there are several things very similar.
- AAU basketball involves a lot of travel and games (like DA/ECNL) - Competing leagues with an adidas circuit and a nike circuit who rarely play agaist each other (DA/ECNL) - The truly elite teams have big sponsors (like MLS DA Academy's) and coaches can make big money (like club directors). - Size and athleticism are huge and play a large role in how far you can advance as a player.
- In US basketball, we complain that there are too many games and not enough emphasis on fundamentals in the US, which is why people rave euro big man skills while ours are 50% free throw shooters. People always say there is to much one on one, exactly what this article praises. In soccer, they developed a system to fix counter that (which I bet basketball experts would like) and now we say our system develops robots, it doesn't let players express themselves.
The article points out just because we dominate women's soccer doesn't mean we are doing it right and then seems to make that assumption that the US basketball model has figured it out when that world would have huge concerns with the AAU model as well. They are simply different issues.
Simply put, I am tired of hearing how bad our model is without realist plans to fix it. We all know the model isn't perfect, it shuts huge portions of our population out, no one disagrees with you. But unless you present realistic solution (not make everything free with no plan of where the $ comes from) then we are all wasting our time reading the same article over and over again.
This may have touched a nerve...
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Post by atv on Aug 15, 2018 9:43:40 GMT -5
Read the article and have to agree, nothing new here. Everything has been said before.
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Post by surgesoccer on Aug 15, 2018 10:11:40 GMT -5
Can't help but think that one of the biggest issue to sports development is over-development. Not in sports but in land use. When I was a kid we had several places we could play sports. One of our football (American) spots was an empty piece of land in a cemetery. Another was about a 20 yard by 60 yard space right next to an Amtrak rail line. For baseball we played under a bridge in sand and rocks. There were football or baseball games after school and every weekend.
I don't see that many open spaces anymore as houses and what not have been thrown up everywhere. And when I do see an open space there are no kids around. We had 3 channels of tv, no internet or computers, so all you had to do was get out and play.
What's needed is more free play. Build more small (futsal size) soccer pitches in the inner city and suburbs and kids will play on their own. Clubs can be good at developing players in a structured environment but creativity comes from have the option to try things without worrying about what a coach or parent thinks.
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Post by soccerfan30 on Aug 15, 2018 10:25:04 GMT -5
Ask any boy 10-17, I would guess 70%+ or more spend more time playing Fortnite, FIFA or Madden then they do practicing soccer on their own.
Therein lies one of the biggest roadblocks
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Post by Soccerhouse on Aug 15, 2018 10:28:57 GMT -5
I've never in all my years seen a game as addicting and social as Fortnite.
hear is the schedule: wake up watch youtube fortnite eat breakfast while watching youtube fortnite go to school and talk about fortnite come home from school and watch youtube fortnite go to soccer talk about fortnite at soccer come home from soccer and eat dinner while watching youtube fortnite do homework play fortnite go to sleep while watching youtube fortnite
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Post by soccerfan30 on Aug 15, 2018 10:35:16 GMT -5
I've never in all my years seen a game as addicting and social as Fortnite. hear is the schedule: wake up watch youtube fortnite eat breakfast while watching youtube fortnite go to school and talk about fortnite come home from school and watch youtube fortnite go to soccer talk about fortnite at soccer come home from soccer and eat dinner while watching youtube fortnite do homework play fortnite go to sleep while watching youtube fortnite 1. If kids are consuming that much Fortnite that's a problem, unfortunately the above example is more common than you think. 2. Young counterparts in other countries are playing pickup until dark in the streets, futsal courts and even barren dirt pitches. Forget all the mandates, directives, alphabet leagues, etc this is the biggest reason why we are 20+ years behind everyone else.
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Post by krazykickers on Aug 16, 2018 13:20:23 GMT -5
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Post by Futsal Gawdess on Aug 16, 2018 14:38:12 GMT -5
That article was unapologetically spot on. Short of the fact that only at AU would this not apply because it's free, it was as if the article was referring to every other club in town. I'm curious though what the fix is? DOCs and their minions will not turn off the cash spigot, so what are we left to do but maybe start our own league. Problem is many parents are so brain-washed to open their check-books that I don't see this problem going away anytime soon. It seems like every single facet of US Soccer all the way down to the U3/U4 kickeroos starting out has huge faults and needs major overhauling. My solution for all the mayhem currently traversing the soccer-world is to get back down to basics and make things simple. Imagine if we collectively coalesced around the fundamentals of soccer. My solution: Have the federation cover the costs of training coaches until they get to the C license. After that, you have to show a real interest and motivate yourself towards getting your A or B license. I would make the costs no more than $3k - $5k. All others are free like in Iceland. - DA to be run exclusively by the MLS clubs(U12, U13, U14, U15, U17, U19): Travel component makes this a money pit for clubs or an added mortgage for players and their families, so let the MLS clubs foot the bill. - Scrap the GDA and resort back to ECNL: I think the US Soccer Federation should cover the costs of travel, players n families pay club fees($2k/less). - State Cup Importance Returns: Divide the country into 8 regions. Each State Cup winner would get an automatic bid to via for the Regional Champion, who would then go on to play for the national champion. - Age Group play within the state: Do away with Athena A/B/X/Y/Z, instead divide the state into a set of divisions with each division get one or two berths into the state cup. Atlanta would get half since a majority of the clubs are in the Atlanta region. Akin to Europe getting more berths in the World Cup. They play their way to becoming state champions and representing the state in the regional, all the way to the national. - Finally Recreational Games within clubs. If a club can't field enough teams or players, the rec program is disbanded or merged with another club based on proximity. It keeps things simple, organized and most importantly, keeps friends together, travel to a minimum, costs down and everyone other than the DOCs happy. I welcome your thoughts and comments.
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Post by atv on Aug 16, 2018 15:55:10 GMT -5
I like the thoughts on coaches but is this a major issue in Georgia? A/B llicensed coaches don’t appear to be in short supply at the top and second level teams around Atlanta. Even smaller clubs seem to have a good number of A/B coaches.
All DA should be aligned with a professional team. Isn’t that what DA is all about? MLS only. Possibly USL teams? My personal opinion is DA should only be for older age groups as I am suspect of anyone telling you they can predict the future pro success of a 12 year old.
The USSF should actively collloborate with the ECNL. The ECNL has done great things for women’s soccer and I bet they would be more than willing to work together with the USSF to make women’s soccer even better.
Agree on State Cup. It used to be pretty awesome and I think everyone should compete.
Agree, we should have some sort of geographical organized system that most groups/ stakeholders buy into. From a player perspective, club identity, and field space needs it makes too much sense. br]
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Post by Soccerhouse on Aug 16, 2018 20:27:02 GMT -5
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Post by rifle on Aug 16, 2018 21:03:11 GMT -5
I’ve been thinking for a while about the stigma that club soccer parents and kids throw at rec soccer. This isn’t sour grapes at all - but a LOT of players I saw in ten years of club soccer patronage were just not that good. But these same kids love the game and would have been much better served playing in a good rec league with some decent coaching. There is so much money thrown around so casually for club soccer .. that it is shocking. I’m thankful to be able to afford it without major strain, but so many other kids are left out because they can’t .. and that’s just a shame.
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Post by mistergrinch on Aug 16, 2018 21:16:52 GMT -5
I’ve been thinking for a while about the stigma that club soccer parents and kids throw at rec soccer. This isn’t sour grapes at all - but a LOT of players I saw in ten years of club soccer patronage were just not that good. But these same kids love the game and would have been much better served playing in a good rec league with some decent coaching. There is so much money thrown around so casually for club soccer .. that it is shocking. I’m thankful to be able to afford it without major strain, but so many other kids are left out because they can’t .. and that’s just a shame.
Never seen one yet, and that's the problem Coaching is volunteer/parent.. and REALLY hit and miss.
My kids each had at least one really good rec coach.. and at least one AWFUL coach. My younger daughter's last rec coach was a professional planned-parenthood protester. She would take all her (homeschooled) kids and stand outside PP clinics yelling at people. She also had never played a minute of soccer.
yeah, sorry.. if rec is going to be worthwhile, we need to do better than that.
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Post by Futsal Gawdess on Aug 17, 2018 7:33:11 GMT -5
I’ve been thinking for a while about the stigma that club soccer parents and kids throw at rec soccer. This isn’t sour grapes at all - but a LOT of players I saw in ten years of club soccer patronage were just not that good. But these same kids love the game and would have been much better served playing in a good rec league with some decent coaching. There is so much money thrown around so casually for club soccer .. that it is shocking. I’m thankful to be able to afford it without major strain, but so many other kids are left out because they can’t .. and that’s just a shame. Earlier in my kids soccer career when they played Rec, the Director of Rec would do something I wish more clubs would do. One day a week, he would collectively run practice with the volunteer coaches as his assistant coaches. He would show the players and the parents(coaches) how to run a practice and specifically how to teach whatever he had on the agenda for that week. Now in his case he had a "curriculum" of sorts. So every week he would want the kids to learn a particular part of soccer. Trapping, driving, dribbling, defending, shooting, moves, etc. In discussions we had with him, his goal was to give the rec players a good understanding of soccer and get them ready and primed for Academy/Select if they wanted or had the ability to.
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Post by rifle on Aug 17, 2018 19:41:09 GMT -5
That sounds like a decent club.
My niece played for tophat and it appeared that they used the rec program for teaching and scouting. What a concept.
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