Is USSDA working after 10 yrs?

espola said:
What particular techniques distinguish training to be professional from training for college?
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I believe there is a big difference. The "training" involves the type of physical specimen being sought for the college game, which typically means giant backs, very fast forwards without regard to touch, and a physically strong player who prefers to bang as much as anything else. They don't worry about building from the back and they play long to speedy forwards. Whereas the professional training (which fewer than half of the so cal DA clubs i've seen practice) involves timing, ball movement, building from the back and passing in tight spaces up top. The emphasis is on agility and first touch and vision.
 
thedudeabides said:
No doubt, SoCal is the epicenter of U.S. soccer. This furthers my point that the DA's are failing to produce great players. What are the objective measures that really say the DA system is improving? It is a vessel that will always fill. If you had 60 DA's in SoCal tomorrow you would fill them up instantly because there are enough parents willing to shell out the time and bucks but that doesn't mean there were twice as many DA quality players that magically appeared.

SoCal and the U.S for that matter, only produce a small fraction of the talent Spain puts out because their best athletes choose soccer first over other sports. Combined with the fact that almost all the top players in the world almost always end up in Europe it is interesting how few SoCal products have played for a first division European team. Will the number go up with all of these DA's, maybe a little but nothing significant. It won't happen until our best athletes look at soccer as a viable choice before football, baseball and basketball. Maybe the sheer number of DA's will garner exposure and start attracting more talent.

If you want your kid to develop and get some college looks, sure go DA but producing world class players is not happening because it starts with selection and I truly feel the best kids aren't being selected or they simply choose one of many other less expensive or time consuming routes. Many parents have figured out the financial and happiness ROI isn't there. If their kid wanted to follow their dream of becoming a pro and they were really good, it makes more sense to go with a professional academy or European academy and not just another club that put in DA paperwork.

And yes, some of the same false pride about SCDSL Flight 1 is out there. At least you have to earn your level in Coast. All this rhetoric about who is really better can simply be solved on the pitch.
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A team earns its level in CSL by winning games. There is no requirement to demonstrate any particular style of play, or to show a record of player development.

I'm not saying that DA does those things, but it's what they claim
 
espola said:
A team earns its level in CSL by winning games. There is no requirement to demonstrate any particular style of play, or to show a record of player development.

I'm not saying that DA does those things, but it's what they claim
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It seems clear that the DA gets the best players, but the "training" being taught is, mostly, not the training and development described in the DA literature. So the kids end up not learning to play to international standards...
 
espola said:
What particular techniques distinguish training to be professional from training for college?
Click to expand...

It mostly goes back to selection and mentality. Parents that are likely affluent and went to college themselves know the system. They know how to get looks from college scouts, grade requirements and registering for hudl etc. they believe and sometimes they are correct that that the DA teams will get more college looks than non DA teams. these parents aren't thinking that much about professional academies in Europe. When you go watch the top clubs/teams/players in SoCal there are a lot of very talented Latino players on the boys side. However, our national team doesn't reflect that. The affluent white kids are getting more academy opportunities. I know they have tried to change this in recent years but all the travel and time away from home for two earner households is very tough on families. In Europe there are few barriers to entry if you are good enough. However, the rules have changed a lot because now they can't bring you over as easily if you are from a non EU nation. The director said they have actually used this to their advantage because the boys that typically come over from the states are not as ready to make this transition as those they get from other countries. He thought it was because the American kids lacked independence because of the way their parents hovered over them. He's probably right.

So to your question, does the Professional European training look that much different from what we do at a lowly non-DA club.....not really but as I said earlier, I would put our coaches up against any A licensed coach with an English accent any day.
 
thedudeabides said:
It mostly goes back to selection and mentality. Parents that are likely affluent and went to college themselves know the system. They know how to get looks from college scouts, grade requirements and registering for hudl etc. they believe and sometimes they are correct that that the DA teams will get more college looks than non DA teams. these parents aren't thinking that much about professional academies in Europe. When you go watch the top clubs/teams/players in SoCal there are a lot of very talented Latino players on the boys side. However, our national team doesn't reflect that. The affluent white kids are getting more academy opportunities. I know they have tried to change this in recent years but all the travel and time away from home for two earner households is very tough on families. In Europe there are few barriers to entry if you are good enough. However, the rules have changed a lot because now they can't bring you over as easily if you are from a non EU nation. The director said they have actually used this to their advantage because the boys that typically come over from the states are not as ready to make this transition as those they get from other countries. He thought it was because the American kids lacked independence because of the way their parents hovered over them. He's probably right.

So to your question, does the Professional European training look that much different from what we do at a lowly non-DA club.....not really but as I said earlier, I would put our coaches up against any A licensed coach with an English accent any day.
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You didn't really answer the question.
 
espola said:
A team earns its level in CSL by winning games. There is no requirement to demonstrate any particular style of play, or to show a record of player development.

I'm not saying that DA does those things, but it's what they claim
Click to expand...

Several new clubs jumped there teams straight to CSL premier from other leagues even if they where near bottom of table in those leagues this & other years. After that yes they need to earn placement for the following years sometimes depending on demand and whatnot.
 
mahrez said:
Several new clubs jumped there teams straight to CSL premier from other leagues even if they where near bottom of table in those leagues this & other years. After that yes they need to earn placement for the following years sometimes depending on demand and whatnot.
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Which clubs? We tried that several years ago with a team of high-school-age boys that went undefeated in Presidio Premier and then made it to semifinals of National Cup. We were told we would have to start in Gold, with no home games, which meant traveling all over Southern California. The reason given was that any team we bumped from CSL Premier came from a club that already had many other teams playing in CSL, and we were only bringing in one.
 
espola said:
Which clubs? We tried that several years ago with a team of high-school-age boys that went undefeated in Presidio Premier and then made it to semifinals of National Cup. We were told we would have to start in Gold, with no home games, which meant traveling all over Southern California. The reason given was that any team we bumped from CSL Premier came from a club that already had many other teams playing in CSL, and we were only bringing in one.
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Yeah times have changed, 4 in just this thread, 2002 DA Academies - Where are they now? http://www.socalsoccer.com/threads/2002-da-academies-where-are-they-now.3918/

Premier is big $$$ league fee so not for everyone and politics does take a part like all the others....
 
espola said:
A team earns its level in CSL by winning games. There is no requirement to demonstrate any particular style of play, or to show a record of player development.

I'm not saying that DA does those things, but it's what they claim
Click to expand...

Agreed but I go back to the idea that development and winning aren't mutually exclusive. If you develop kids properly they will win more than they lose and you don't have to wait until U16, as some coaches claim, to start winning. I actually think it is an insult to coaches to assume that if they are winning too much they are sacrificing development. What a load of crap. At the end of the day, soccer is a team sport that awards wins, losses, and draws based purely on how many balls go in the net. The final objective is winning, plain and simple. Sure we can say it is a secondary objective in the early years but development is for players to get better so they can eventually help their team.....everyone say it with me......WIN
 
thedudeabides said:
Agreed but I go back to the idea that development and winning aren't mutually exclusive. If you develop kids properly they will win more than they lose and you don't have to wait until U16, as some coaches claim, to start winning. I actually think it is an insult to coaches to assume that if they are winning too much they are sacrificing development. What a load of crap. At the end of the day, soccer is a team sport that awards wins, losses, and draws based purely on how many balls go in the net. The final objective is winning, plain and simple. Sure we can say it is a secondary objective in the early years but development is for players to get better so they can eventually help their team.....everyone say it with me......WIN
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The underlying reason for training with a "development" focus is so that the properly-developed players look more attractive to some other coach, at a higher level (such as national team, college, pro). Or so I have been told by coaches when they were in recruiting mode, but not so much in training.
 
thedudeabides said:
It mostly goes back to selection and mentality. Parents that are likely affluent and went to college themselves know the system. They know how to get looks from college scouts, grade requirements and registering for hudl etc. they believe and sometimes they are correct that that the DA teams will get more college looks than non DA teams. these parents aren't thinking that much about professional academies in Europe. When you go watch the top clubs/teams/players in SoCal there are a lot of very talented Latino players on the boys side. However, our national team doesn't reflect that. The affluent white kids are getting more academy opportunities. I know they have tried to change this in recent years but all the travel and time away from home for two earner households is very tough on families. In Europe there are few barriers to entry if you are good enough. However, the rules have changed a lot because now they can't bring you over as easily if you are from a non EU nation. The director said they have actually used this to their advantage because the boys that typically come over from the states are not as ready to make this transition as those they get from other countries. He thought it was because the American kids lacked independence because of the way their parents hovered over them. He's probably right.

So to your question, does the Professional European training look that much different from what we do at a lowly non-DA club.....not really but as I said earlier, I would put our coaches up against any A licensed coach with an English accent any day.
Click to expand...

I have to disagree with your last paragraph, my son played for a non-da team and now plays for a DA side, and both are not even close to a standard euro training/practice session. Heck, even training at my low level neigborhood club back home had better drills and better coaches for sure. The gap is visible, every year when i take kids back home we can notice difference in quality, and unfortunately both da and non-da clubs are far behind even low level euro clubs...
 
JJP said:
How can there be consolidation with 3 leagues not playing each other?
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"In theory", leagues like CSL & SCDSL are feeding top talent into the DA system, as top players seek the next level up on the skill ladder. Obviously there are still fantastic non-DA teams.
 
Wez said:
"In theory", leagues like CSL & SCDSL are feeding top talent into the DA system, as top players seek the next level up on the skill ladder. Obviously there are still fantastic non-DA teams.
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Brilliant. You sound very smart when you state the obvious.
 
Zvezdas said:
I have to disagree with your last paragraph, my son played for a non-da team and now plays for a DA side, and both are not even close to a standard euro training/practice session. Heck, even training at my low level neigborhood club back home had better drills and better coaches for sure. The gap is visible, every year when i take kids back home we can notice difference in quality, and unfortunately both da and non-da clubs are far behind even low level euro clubs...
Click to expand...

Actually, I think the nuance of my sentiment got lost in several responses. I was actually agreeing with you. I had said European professional standards from my limited exposure seemed much higher in general than US clubs, DA and non-DA. I don't know if I can sum it up in a neat sentence like someone had asked me to do but when I see DA teams picking up kids that would have a hard time starting for us, I know the politics is a big difference. European professional academies are training kids to one day possibly play for their professional team. The amount of investment dollars at stake is insane. Yes, there are politics everywhere, but from what I hear Mexico and the U.S. are the worst and look at the professional teams from those two countries. I think there are almost 70 European clubs rated ahead of the top Mexican team.

I was simply making the point that in our overly fragmented U.S. system, labels begin to mean nothing. Yes, Europe seems to have a good formula but I have also seen DA and non DA clubs try to mimic that model and fail because they were unable to shun politics to truly get the best players. What DA has done has tried to say hey, we're DA so if you are a great player, your only option is us. however, they make this claim with no objective standard to say why that is true. Europe has a proven track record of success. At the end of the day the overall success of a club will be determined on the quality of the players it recruits. I just think the DA system has put the cart before the horse.

In my final paragraph I was just pointing out that although the US system is inferior to Europe's, I believe our individual team has produced something that more closely resembles that of Europe's because we are able to get the top kids to turn down DA and choose our system based on real results, abandoning politics, focusing on development and ultimately winning.
 
espola said:
What particular techniques distinguish training to be professional from training for college?
Click to expand...

Have you watched both college and European soccer live? An 18 year old Messi playing in SoCal would have a hard time getting a scholarship to UCLA. OK, maybe that is exaggeration bu
Zvezdas said:
I agree with most of your argument, however even the best Euro academies are not free of politics! An idea that European top academies gather only the best kids and are politics free is just another blatant lie some here on the board like to propagate.
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Absolutely true because by the new rules they can't just bring them over for extended periods of time. The director at the European academy we were associated with said that if a kid looked good enough for their standards they were happy to leave them in that US Club environment. They would stay in communication with the coach and direct as needed. More like our ODP system than our DA system. He went on to say that the US club system had improved dramatically in the past 10 years as far as volume of quality players but stated that the pay for play system was our biggest problem that was holding us back.
 
thedudeabides said:
Actually, I think the nuance of my sentiment got lost in several responses. I was actually agreeing with you. I had said European professional standards from my limited exposure seemed much higher in general than US clubs, DA and non-DA. I don't know if I can sum it up in a neat sentence like someone had asked me to do but when I see DA teams picking up kids that would have a hard time starting for us, I know the politics is a big difference. European professional academies are training kids to one day possibly play for their professional team. The amount of investment dollars at stake is insane. Yes, there are politics everywhere, but from what I hear Mexico and the U.S. are the worst and look at the professional teams from those two countries. I think there are almost 70 European clubs rated ahead of the top Mexican team.

I was simply making the point that in our overly fragmented U.S. system, labels begin to mean nothing. Yes, Europe seems to have a good formula but I have also seen DA and non DA clubs try to mimic that model and fail because they were unable to shun politics to truly get the best players. What DA has done has tried to say hey, we're DA so if you are a great player, your only option is us. however, they make this claim with no objective standard to say why that is true. Europe has a proven track record of success. At the end of the day the overall success of a club will be determined on the quality of the players it recruits. I just think the DA system has put the cart before the horse.

In my final paragraph I was just pointing out that although the US system is inferior to Europe's, I believe our individual team has produced something that more closely resembles that of Europe's because we are able to get the top kids to turn down DA and choose our system based on real results, abandoning politics, focusing on development and ultimately winning. I was also not referring to a European academy in that final sentence but stating that DA's seem to think employing a DOC with an accent makes them legit.
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thedudeabides said:
Have you watched both college and European soccer live? An 18 year old Messi playing in SoCal would have a hard time getting a scholarship to UCLA. OK, maybe that is exaggeration bu


Absolutely true because by the new rules they can't just bring them over for extended periods of time. The director at the European academy we were associated with said that if a kid looked good enough for their standards they were happy to leave them in that US Club environment. They would stay in communication with the coach and direct as needed. More like our ODP system than our DA system. He went on to say that the US club system had improved dramatically in the past 10 years as far as volume of quality players but stated that the pay for play system was our biggest problem that was holding us back.
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What I asked about was the difference in training techniques between European and American youth academies. It's an objective question, not theoretical.
 
espola said:
You didn't really answer the question.
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Actually, you didn't answer my question. I answered you how it was different and I also said the training techniques weren't much different from what I was seeing from solid US clubs or teams that were decentralized. I also provided an example where the European club academy director agreed with that generalization.
 
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