How U.S. Soccer can begin to fix its broken youth system

@Vin Thanks for sharing another great read.

I love this quote and has a lot of weight...

"High school soccer has a lot to offer – facilities, fan interest, social importance, history. Many of the coaches are also club coaches with A licenses and vast soccer knowledge. Some aren’t.

As it stands now, scholastic soccer isn’t represented in U.S. Soccer. The groups simply aren’t part of the discussion. Why not?"
 
coachsamy said:
@Vin Thanks for sharing another great read.

I love this quote and has a lot of weight...

"High school soccer has a lot to offer – facilities, fan interest, social importance, history. Many of the coaches are also club coaches with A licenses and vast soccer knowledge. Some aren’t.

As it stands now, scholastic soccer isn’t represented in U.S. Soccer. The groups simply aren’t part of the discussion. Why not?"
Click to expand...

Neither is NCAA.
 
Vin said:
https://www.fourfourtwo.com/us/feat...-system?_format=amp&__twitter_impression=true
Click to expand...

Good read, really makes one think about what's happened in the last 2-3 years, the Age Matrix, (I think everyone saw the writing on the wall for that one), DA, DA2, now going back somewhat to combined ages. I think it was too many changes in too short a period and now it's, how do they fix it?... :confused: I don't see an easy answer, maybe the fastest would be for parents to find a local team that's a good fit, stop the excessive travel, stop paying excessive fee's and things may start to level out. The above changes have helped regular club fee's go from the mid $1500 to $3K in less than 3 years, crazy and there's no end in site. Now I hear to make it more interesting, HS is moving their season up 1-2 weeks, right when the biggest Thanksgiving college recruiting happens in CA. :eek: ....maybe they should have left everything alone? :oops:
 
Vin said:
https://www.fourfourtwo.com/us/feat...-system?_format=amp&__twitter_impression=true
Click to expand...

Almost everything in this article unintentionally highlights USSF stupidity. Only USSF would think a prettier org chart with more bureaucracy constitutes progress. Their time spent figuring out how to cram new layers onto a Word doc while still keeping it to one page would be far better spent kicking a soccer ball around the back yard with their kids.

USSF efforts to mandate how to define “Academy”, “Elite” and “Premier” are equally moronic. “Academy” is an ordinary word that has been used appropriately since forever until USSF tried to claim exclusive use for itself when it created the DA. “It’s my word!” “No, it’s my word!” “I don’t care what the dictionary says, you can’t use the word academy to describe your academy because now I have an academy!” Yes, very helpful USSF wasting resources trying to own a word, and how magnanimous to leave “elite” and “premier” to everyone else. How many meetings did it take to decide that redefining words was the key to the future of US soccer anyway? Maybe USSF can add another committee to the org chart to discuss further.

I particularly like the idea of giving out gold stars to clubs for nice websites. It worked in kindergarten, so why not? The more time and money those uber-rich youth clubs spend on websites instead of actual soccer, the better.

But the real key to soccer domination is, of course, ensuring HS teams in the DC area all play during the same season. The future of the sport certainly depends on whether Dunbar High gets to play Sidwell Friends. As we all know, all great soccer players are forged in the crucible of HS soccer along the beltway.

Look, if USSF wants to reduce chaos, stop causing it and get out of the way. ECNL definitively proved the best way to create a top notch system involves leaving USSF out of it. In fact, it took USSF interference to f**k things up. Literally everything USSF does in youth soccer drives kids and families away from it, whether it’s busting up teams with age group changes, making the highest levels cost prohibitive for and otherwise inaccessible to most, propping up numerous poorly run and crappy clubs in its GDA, trying to take down leagues that work, or running an operation that shows a complete and utter disregard for academics. Seriously, missing 10 days of school a year to play DA/GDA, or 20+ if you play on one of the kiddie national teams, is insane.

We would all be better served if USSF fired 3/4 of its staff, got out of youth soccer completely and used the savings to drop a million soccer balls from helicopters across the country. Problem solved.
 
InTheValley said:
Almost everything in this article unintentionally highlights USSF stupidity. Only USSF would think a prettier org chart with more bureaucracy constitutes progress. Their time spent figuring out how to cram new layers onto a Word doc while still keeping it to one page would be far better spent kicking a soccer ball around the back yard with their kids.

USSF efforts to mandate how to define “Academy”, “Elite” and “Premier” are equally moronic. “Academy” is an ordinary word that has been used appropriately since forever until USSF tried to claim exclusive use for itself when it created the DA. “It’s my word!” “No, it’s my word!” “I don’t care what the dictionary says, you can’t use the word academy to describe your academy because now I have an academy!” Yes, very helpful USSF wasting resources trying to own a word, and how magnanimous to leave “elite” and “premier” to everyone else. How many meetings did it take to decide that redefining words was the key to the future of US soccer anyway? Maybe USSF can add another committee to the org chart to discuss further.

I particularly like the idea of giving out gold stars to clubs for nice websites. It worked in kindergarten, so why not? The more time and money those uber-rich youth clubs spend on websites instead of actual soccer, the better.

But the real key to soccer domination is, of course, ensuring HS teams in the DC area all play during the same season. The future of the sport certainly depends on whether Dunbar High gets to play Sidwell Friends. As we all know, all great soccer players are forged in the crucible of HS soccer along the beltway.

Look, if USSF wants to reduce chaos, stop causing it and get out of the way. ECNL definitively proved the best way to create a top notch system involves leaving USSF out of it. In fact, it took USSF interference to f**k things up. Literally everything USSF does in youth soccer drives kids and families away from it, whether it’s busting up teams with age group changes, making the highest levels cost prohibitive for and otherwise inaccessible to most, propping up numerous poorly run and crappy clubs in its GDA, trying to take down leagues that work, or running an operation that shows a complete and utter disregard for academics. Seriously, missing 10 days of school a year to play DA/GDA, or 20+ if you play on one of the kiddie national teams, is insane.

We would all be better served if USSF fired 3/4 of its staff, got out of youth soccer completely and used the savings to drop a million soccer balls from helicopters across the country. Problem solved.
Click to expand...


BK?
 
InTheValley said:
Almost everything in this article unintentionally highlights USSF stupidity. Only USSF would think a prettier org chart with more bureaucracy constitutes progress. Their time spent figuring out how to cram new layers onto a Word doc while still keeping it to one page would be far better spent kicking a soccer ball around the back yard with their kids.

USSF efforts to mandate how to define “Academy”, “Elite” and “Premier” are equally moronic. “Academy” is an ordinary word that has been used appropriately since forever until USSF tried to claim exclusive use for itself when it created the DA. “It’s my word!” “No, it’s my word!” “I don’t care what the dictionary says, you can’t use the word academy to describe your academy because now I have an academy!” Yes, very helpful USSF wasting resources trying to own a word, and how magnanimous to leave “elite” and “premier” to everyone else. How many meetings did it take to decide that redefining words was the key to the future of US soccer anyway? Maybe USSF can add another committee to the org chart to discuss further.

I particularly like the idea of giving out gold stars to clubs for nice websites. It worked in kindergarten, so why not? The more time and money those uber-rich youth clubs spend on websites instead of actual soccer, the better.

But the real key to soccer domination is, of course, ensuring HS teams in the DC area all play during the same season. The future of the sport certainly depends on whether Dunbar High gets to play Sidwell Friends. As we all know, all great soccer players are forged in the crucible of HS soccer along the beltway.

Look, if USSF wants to reduce chaos, stop causing it and get out of the way. ECNL definitively proved the best way to create a top notch system involves leaving USSF out of it. In fact, it took USSF interference to f**k things up. Literally everything USSF does in youth soccer drives kids and families away from it, whether it’s busting up teams with age group changes, making the highest levels cost prohibitive for and otherwise inaccessible to most, propping up numerous poorly run and crappy clubs in its GDA, trying to take down leagues that work, or running an operation that shows a complete and utter disregard for academics. Seriously, missing 10 days of school a year to play DA/GDA, or 20+ if you play on one of the kiddie national teams, is insane.

We would all be better served if USSF fired 3/4 of its staff, got out of youth soccer completely and used the savings to drop a million soccer balls from helicopters across the country. Problem solved.
Click to expand...
Amazingly true on every point!! Thank you for your post.
 
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