The reality is Women's World Cup is still really a Amateur level tournament. The amount and quality of professional leagues around the world is just developing and hopefully capable of growth. So, in a tournament that is essentially amateurs our college system will remain king. But, for the good of the women's game internationally we should be willing to support multiple, healthy and viable professionals leagues here and abroad.
ECNL vs. DA turf war has created a 'toxic environment'
- Thread starter VegasParent
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The reality is Women's World Cup is still really a Amateur level tournament. The amount and quality of professional leagues around the world is just developing and hopefully capable of growth. So, in a tournament that is essentially amateurs our college system will remain king. But, for the good of the women's game internationally we should be willing to support multiple, healthy and viable professionals leagues here and abroad.
vegasguy
GOLD
UNLV Women's team played Argentina's World Cup Women's team in April for a Spring Game and a WWC tune up match for Argentina. UNLV (many played high school) won 1-0. Argentina went on to tie Scotland and Japan and lose to England 1 to 0. I think Utah Valley also beat Argentina. The Rebels did not make the Women's College Cup this year. So is our way working out ok for the women?
vegasguy
GOLD
Substitute US Men and MLS for women's and domestically for abroad and you have the US Men's argument for the last 20+ years. We as a soccer country are different and are a different as men and women development. It is ok to be different. There are a multiple ways to develop quality world class players. We need to embrace that instead of a "program".
MakeAPlay
DA
I agree with you. My player will most likely be playing in England come December so I hear you. She isn't exactly enamored with the NWSL unless she was guaranteed to play for Portland or North Carolina. Our domestic league has a way to go in terms of facilities and pay. I wish that US Soccer would invest some of their war chest on paying the ladies better and subsidizing some investments in facilities. That in my opinion would be money better spent than giving bigger guaranteed salaries to a small group of players (many of whom have endorsements too) while the rest of the players live off of peanuts because they truly love the game and want to play as long as they are able.
Our family friends who have been strong baseball players cover a wide spectrum. My high school buddy (he had a car and we were dating sisters) got a free trip to Florida for half of spring training and was driving a cab the last time I saw him. Some of my kids' classmates got college scholarships and/or signing bonuses and a couple are still active players. Baseball and basketball (and hockey too if you live where that can be played outdoors) have the funding available to winnow out thousands of players to find the one or two who will play at the highest level. Soccer as currently instituted in the USA does not.
dk_b
GOLD
I don't disagree that growing the game requires that but I am not sure "we should" do any of that - I mean, this is a captive audience of very supportive, dedicated folks. But still this group is not representative of the vast, vast majority of people out there. And unless/until there are real economic incentives for multiple, healthy, viable professional leagues, women's soccer will remain the cream at the top but not much more beyond that. The world is a soccer world but most countries with soccer cultures do not promote girls/women playing soccer like occurs here. Even where there is a lot of participation at the young ages, much of that drops off when the girls hit puberty. That said, even in the countries where it is flourishing, there is lack of support at the gate, in uniform purchases, in sponsorship opportunities, in broadcast range. Solve for all of that, there MAY be a jump. I certainly hope so b/c I do enjoy the game and want it to expand. But one of the main reasons that the WNBA continues is b/c it has a major benefactor in the NBA - if FIFA really wanted to grow the women's game, it could be that benefactor. If not FIFA, maybe the European leagues but I think they'd almost need to do it HERE.
I wasn't insinuating that you were... more just making the statement myself so nobody thinks I would begrudge any kid that is currently getting an opportunity. I totally agree regarding your point about college being the end game. However, for my DD, college is the beginning of the game because she does want to be on the NT and she most likely won't have that opportunity until she hits college because of her ECNL affiliation. One correction on the college success would be MVLA. MVLA would have similar if not same success college placement as Quakes and Mustang.
Not sure what you mean by that. Isn't there always a "program" of some sort?
dk_b
GOLD
I was clarifying, not taking issue. I could see that we were on pretty much the same page.
I was leaving out the MVLA group b/c I don't think the 01 and 02 groups have quite the college placement though it is really good. However, their very special 04 group will be really impactful. In fact, some point to that as a big ECNL/GDA/YNT example - they had multiple YNT players at past camps but the most recent one (I think) had zero. (The discussion of MVLA and Quakes that I like is more soccer-based since, in NorCal, it is hard to find better teachers of the game than Albertin and Andres)
MakeAPlay
DA
Where will they get the players from? Some of these countries are small and we are talking a peak age range of 18-32. If you add up all of the top teams in all of the leagues in Europe you might have 40 teams maybe 50 and many of those players will be American. That still isn't anywhere close to the sheer numbers that even NCAA D1 has (320+ teams). Not to mention that the University of Arkansas women's team, for example, spends more than your typical pro team even has in it's budget.
I hope that they get serious about further growing the women's game so that it becomes economically viable, however, if Boris Johnson looking like he might come to power indicates anything then Europe is going backwards not forward.
The women on the current USWNT could have chosen to play Chess in high school instead of soccer and they still would have won the World Cup. In a amateur tournament we have the worlds best amateur development model with college. But how long will the Women's World cup remain a amateur tournament as professional leagues develop?
There were no youth leagues for girls in the UK until 1970. Other nations were also slow to allow girls to even play the game. The girls youth game in Europe is really only starting to grow and as I stated earlier, the Dutch women's team played in their first international tournament in 2009. To go from just entering a tournament to World Cup finalist in just ten years should open some eyes.
For the womens game in Europe- If the Euro clubs are paying better than NWSL - then for a while, you'll see lots of American women playing there. A pro league doesn't care where you were born. (Look at MLS - they have homegrown player advantages for teams - But all of the superstars are from other countries).
dk_b
GOLD
My kid is at Gothia Cup this week (played last year as well) and can see the growth of the youth game by the club teams from around the world attending the event. But the investment at the younger ages AND the reframing of team sports for girls/young women is much greater than a 10 year project. Until then, there will be countries making strides but it needs to be way broader.
dk_b
GOLD
But is that sufficient to grow at the base (youth) levels? In some countries that requires a cultural shift - not that they don’t support women’s athletics but that they support the opportunities for ANY 5 year old, 10 year old, 12 year old girl to play (not just the identified athletic ones). We have a developed sports culture here and for decades it has included girls. Other countries have a “soccer culture” but those are not the same thing. I’d love to see evidence that team sports participation rates in other countries are similar to ours. Title IX was - and continues to be - an amazingly powerful force. Are there similar laws elsewhere or do things need to happen organically? These issues are not simple - not to my tiny brain anyway.
The USA has the population and the resources to support a dozen or more youth teams (both for boys and girls) that would be competitive in international play. We just have to find the WILL.
MakeAPlay
DA
Again I don't disagree with you. You still have to consider what financial commitment are the European countries going to make AND where are they going to get the players. We are talking about an age range of 18-32+ and in order to at least be the equals of our girls they are going to have to be in an organized system since about 10 years of age. Think about it, our girls that are playing college on average have been playing club soccer for 6-10 years prior to getting to college. One of the main reasons that so many European teenagers are Pro-Am players in their top leagues is because of the dearth of sufficiently developed players. It is just a numbers game. One of my daughter's teammates has been playing on her countries full national team since she was 15. That simply is no longer possible in the US due to the size of the player pool. Once, decades ago you could have a Mia Hamm playing with the US WNT at the age of 14/15. That simply isn't the case due to where we are in our soccer development on the women's side as a country. Heck England's starting GK is a SoCal girl born and raised who went to CS Fullerton!
vegasguy
GOLD
In an article about DA v. ECNL, USSoccer called DA a "program" and ECNL a league. Yes they are all programs but in the end they are also leagues.
I think we are talking past each other a bit here.
I'm looking at and talking much further downstream than the current 18-32+ age range. I'm looking at the kids who are truly the next generation in Europe who will have grown up never knowing a lack of women's professional leagues and have watched this world cup. The infrastructure, system, acceptance AND expectations are now being laid by the pro clubs in general.
Also things have happened pretty quickly in short order elswhere. Japan won a world cup 8 years ago, lost in the finals 4 years ago and managed only one win in this years world cup. To go from US rival to escaping group stage to be eliminated in the first knockout game to a ten year startup in Netherlands. And lets not forget that this is only the eighth Women's World Cup. Mia Hamm is not even a grandmother yet so the women's game is still in its infancy internationally.
I believe going forward that European nations will no longer have any trouble developing a large and very competitive player pool that can match ours. Title 9 will always drive high achieving interest in club soccer but the college game will stagnate our development in comparison in the long run. Our over confidence and complacency will dig us a hole we not be able to climb out.
End of the Line
SILVER ELITE
People have been saying the same thing for 20 years, yet nothing changes. Every four years fools like MAP freak out when France beats the U.S. in a friendly that our WNT wasn't even trying to win. There have always been a handful of countries that can compete with the U.S. in the short term, but they all come and go. The only constant is that the U.S. always stays at the top of the food chain. Always. Why is that?
Sheer volume. In the U.S., there are good reasons for 16-17 year old girls - and lots of them - to continue playing soccer. First, it is fun. Second, there is a legitimate financial reason for a lot of 16-17 year old girls to train and play hard, which is that doing so provides college opportunities that might otherwise not be available. In every other country in the world, it is virtually always a really dumb idea for a 16-17 year old girl to spend any significant amount of their time playing soccer, let alone giving up everything else and jeopardizing their future in order to play in a soccer academy. First, training all day every day is no fun. Second, a European or Japanese girl training hard at 16 so she can play soccer at 21 is the dumbest thing I've ever heard (and any remotely intelligent European or Japanese parent has ever heard) with the exception of maybe one or two players in an entire country, whereas it's a great idea for thousands of girls in the U.S. who are trying to improve their college prospects. As much as people denigrate college soccer, the U.S. will always have the advantage because of it. The U.S. will always have the sheer numbers - unless and until USSF "succeeds" with its GDA and, in doing so: (1) drives kids out of the sport in volumes by taking the fun out of it (e.g. the HS ban and relegating millions of youth girls to lower tier leagues due either to geography or the high cost of participation); (2) downplays the only legitimate reason a 17 year old girl should be playing so much soccer (college); and (3) injures the bulk of the talent like it did with the 6 U18 YNT players who played GDA and tore ACLs in a 12 month period. That last one was just for you.
There will never be enough money in women's soccer to tip the scales, because the sport just isn't that great. The Netherlands will never maintain a great team long term, nor will France. They will both fade like Japan, like Germany before Japan, and like China before Germany. Occasionally, a foreign academy will produce one or two circus jugglers who also happen to be tremendous athletes who can rival or exceed the best the U.S. has to offer. Sometimes those two plus their middling supporting cast will, on their best day, beat the U.S. But no one will ever be able to consistently put 11 studs on the field like the U.S., with more in the stable. It will never happen. Just like basketball. Just like softball.
MakeAPlay
DA
You are just so stupid that you can't get out of your own way. Even your good points are stupid because of the crybaby victim who is delivering them. I suggest that you change your screen name. Too many people don't really care what you have to say because you are a fucking whiner.
Keep whining. Let's hope that you don't pass it along.
Dos Equis
GOLD
The statement summarizes US Soccer's view of ECNL. In fact, they viewed ECNL even more narrowly than just a "league", but a "college showcase league." They said that with a full amount of condescension, as if catering to college recruiting and college coaches was incongruous with elite youth soccer.
End of the Line
SILVER ELITE
Funny, you seem to care quite a lot about what I have to say.
Speaking of not being able to get out of the way, what happened at your kid's sixth grade graduation? You might also want to change your screen name.