G2010 - How’s the 2022 season going?
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I have some amazing war stories about what your saying and I agree with most of what your saying. Good night bro
ValSoccer40
BRONZE
Please don’t.I will share more "War Stories with Crush" tomorrow. Good night friends
Welcome to the forum Val. I see your just two weeks old. Are you a Doc or coach? You and Rainbow can just skip my posts. My DM is lighting up with love mail and I just love helping others. Tell you what. I will continue war stories with crush if someone "loves" this post. If I get no love, then I will stop. DM works great so I can help folks that way as well. You and Rainbow make it a gr8t day
LMAO Crush! Just like this board, this experience should be fun. I love the competition and work ethic my daughter is building, but the hardest thing for me is to avoid getting so wrapped up in being on the best team this young especially with these toxic coaches that treat these girls like cattle at 12 years old. If they had the potential to become academy players on a journey to make $500k a year like the boys, you have my attention, but I'm not going to risk injuries and my daughter's loss of time in her youth for them especially after what I saw at ecnl tryouts this year. I lost so much respect for some coaches mentioned in here. We found a great place this year and her team will be within a goal of the top tier teams I think even with all their recruiting. Matter of fact, all their recruiting just provides a better team for us to compete against. I would far rather play better teams and learn the lesson than give the lessons. Maybe I should thank the coaches that recruit more than develop good soccer? Recruiting to win makes the other teams have to work harder and smarter and the real critical period to go anywhere with this is when they are 16 to 18 not 12.
Way up, you are 100% on target and your wisdom is beyond years. I learned the hard way. The great TB told me the best advice ever. I used to ask him if my dd has what it takes to be next level when she was 11 and 12. He told me, "Crush, I've been doing this for 40 years. I can't tell you where your dd will be until she is at least 17." I was like, "why coach, I see something in her now." He said, "The female body will go through much change from 13-17." I started to SMFH on that but then the light went on. Plus, the boys come into play in middle school and high school and that can get many females to quit the game altogether. Add burn out to the mix and the pressure to get good grades and be miss perfect and the chances are slim to none. I tell everyone to just relax. The war stories I have are insane.
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Jimmy, the next war story is for you bro. Thanks for the "love." Before I share the next battle, I want to give a little background where the war was at this stage in 2014. The girls were playing school calendar as well. Basically, August 1st to July 31st so my dd was playing with her school age friends, 03/04. We only had one league of importance, which was ECNL and just a few teams in Socal had ECNL. This caused extreme envy & jealousy from Docs and the parents. I'm talking serious envy, the kind that will trample over girls who just want to play soccer. Let me gather my war stories. Stay tune Jimmy, this one's for you. I love you all, even my enemies who hate me. What's up Doc........lolWelcome to the forum Val. I see your just two weeks old. Are you a Doc or coach? You and Rainbow can just skip my posts. My DM is lighting up with love mail and I just love helping others. Tell you what. I will continue war stories with crush if someone "loves" this post. If I get no love, then I will stop. DM works great so I can help folks that way as well. You and Rainbow make it a gr8t day
One war story coming up for you way up. Let me do one for Jimmy first and then you will be next in line. One day at a time in this circus of musical soccer chairs. Around this age recruiting goes into high gear and the promises of this and that are insane. Scholarships and job offers for Pops starts around when dd is 12.
Scholarship players create more issues than just leaving for the hot team. Their parents also tend to be the type that want to control the team + not be ethically sound. They'll be the dad coach putting together extra practice/workout sessions (for the players they like) on the side. They'll be the ones paying the coach for minutes via privates. They'll also be the ones buddying up with certain parents to try and control + exclude other parents from team decisions. You get the picture totally over engaged + crazy.
Once you've seen a player at a young age that's truly a standout like Trinity Rodman was/is you quickly realize that all the practices in the world + backchannel deals with the coach + etc wont make a difference. Some players are just naturally gifted. If those same players also happen to have a high soccer IQ watch out.
Thank you for your insight Crush! I have not experienced what I am spewing, but I can't help, but shake my head at these parents, managers, and coaches that slither around to disrupt other teams like used car salesmen. They go from club to club as their own kids get injuries and I'm noticing that many of these girls are losing their dominance as other girls mature and properly develop skills with coaches that teach soccer not sales tactics.
I always had a distaste for these parents that move their 8 or 9 year old girls from club to club and burn bridges all the time. What I really learned is how slimey many coaches and clubs are as they fall for the snake oil from these parents. What pisses me off to no end is how they disrupt the good chemistry and culture many teams already have. I will take hard working girls working together to beat the best over parents treating their kids like cattle at such a young age. I used to have coaches that were savvy to this. I worry at the ecnl level that my daughter and I may not have that luxury anymore.
I don't want to be on a team with players that have been with 4 clubs by age 12 especially if they are not amongst the 2 or 3 girls in our age group that truly have the skills to play ecnl in an older bracket. First of all, the talent will level off and today's star will probably not be the 16 year old star. These toxic parents belong with the toxic coaches and to see the drama unfold when they finally smack each other with their venom is so predictable. I just don't want them dripping to my team and have them ruin our culture, because our coach gets star struck over a 12 year old girl soccer player. Of course, we are all just pawns, so the dude abides!
I feel your pain bro. Remember the housing fiasco in early 2000s? I knew this one guy that bragged that he owned 5 homes. I was like, "dude, your a school teacher, how did you pull that off." Many of us are always looking over our shoulders at the greener pasture behind us. The fact is, you need to mow the lawn wherever your at. My intentions to get my dd over with Tad at Blues was going to be her last club hop, I swear. TB coached 6 teams from U11-U18 in 35 years and we were his last team. They all stuck together, minus the one's he would cut at the end of each season. No promises except a fair chance to perform. He never brought guest players but allowed our kids to guest with other teams. He gave each player a 1 year deal. He also gave all the players play time during league to prove themselves. When playoffs (State Cup) came, then he played his best of the best to win it all. It was fair and we were all set, so I thought. ODP= Olympic Development Program. My dd dream was to play in the Olympics and TB started the ODP program so it made sense in my brain to be with the original ODP founder and the first ever U15 YNT team coach. He told me that it was impossible to find the best 14 year olds in America so he and a few others came up with four regions of ODP in America. Those teams would battle and then he and the coaches would pick the best of best from the best players from each region for YNT. I got labeled club hopper and medal chaser dad and the only thing I was doing was helping my dd chase her dream of playing in the Olympics. It hurt my heart to see fathers on here who knew me but would slander me for chasing wins. It was total BS but envy is a killer.
You dont have to be part of the problem.
ECNL is great for 3-4 clubs in socal. Not so much for everyone else.
GA has 1-2 good clubs + a group of top players from other leagues could easily take over a team + make a run.
NPL + DPL are both doing national travel for top teams.
My suggestion is to try and play locally (if possible). Find a good coach that is positive. Confirm that the Club supports their coaches and players.
To my new pals and old foes, "War Stories With Crush" will be delayed until later today. I just found out today is Mothers Day in Latin America so were off to give Grandma a big hug and some lunch. Stay tune. TY again for the footy love, I mean it. The hate mail is increasing but I'm used to it.
To give you some comfort, most ECNL coaches who care about their players just a little bit, do not recruit or want kids with toxic parents. A factor they look at is how long a player has been with their previous clubs and why they left. A kid that has left more than 4 clubs is generally the problem, not the clubs. Excluding parents that move a lot due to jobs.
You will find certain ECNL coaches willing to take toxic families and those are the coaches you want to stay away from because no matter what they tell the players and parents, they don't care about the entire existing team at all. Sophomore and Junior years are very important for girls, so bringing in a toxic family hurts their abilities to perform and look good in front of college scouts.
I hope you're right sockma! We all want the best players on our team and to win games, but recruiting to disrupt other teams is not good for anyone. I mean I'm not surprised and we are not guaranteed anything as parents, but we are writing the checks for this experience. I've just noticed that a lot of the so called top tier teams don't play the best soccer and the coaches don't train their players with good fundamentals. I have first hand seen some very poor training and lack of training technique.
The problem is parents don't get to try the coaches out. Our kids have to tryout for us to pay these coaches, but an ecnl coach should have better training concepts than some I've observed first hand. I basically get the idea that the coaches people talk about most are the best recruiters and their soccer styles are not impressive along with their words of wisdom that I have heard.
Again though, you can tell a coaches abilities by the growth and development of his or her players. If he or she has to recruit to compensate for not developing a good system and player skills, I don't want any part of their training. The proof is in the pudding and good pudding does not need to send slithering parents around to recruit every new up and comer.
Let me put some perspective coming from a parent on one of the top ecnl teams. At the end of the day all girls are in competition with each other for PDP, ODP, USYNT etc. and within their own respective teams. They compete to start & for time on the field. 11v11 onwards all these factors come to play. This is not about fun and games anymore. It's serious just like business and competitive sports in real life. This is the highest level of girls club soccer we are talking about. We are talking about the USA as well so competitiveness matters as a country. Don't expect coaches to develop your individual player. There is only so much they can do with the time given to train a whole team. It's up to your kid to want more and to be the best. To work hard daily for their goals. The player must do technical development on their own time if they want to stay on top and not rely on DOC. Coaches need to teach tactics and show them how to play as a team. Anyone seeking individual player development from their Doc just tells me they are not putting in the extra work outside of practice. Doc's need to trim rosters yearly to remain competitive and weed out the weak or the ones that do not belong at the highest level. If you don't like it, don't play for a top team and go play on another team. There are levels for all sorts of players in club soccer. It plain and simple.... if you want to be the best, then you must train and play with the best and COMPETE
I agree, but the coach has to build a system that will help a player dominate a position and if the coach is more concerned about recruiting than building a winning system, the girls will not develop that dominant role they will need. Back to what I said earlier though. I think it's awesome for some teams to bring the best competition as they focus more on recruiting than building a solid team. I will want my daughter on a top team when she is 16, but until then she can gain just as much dominance for her position on any ecnl team and not have the drama and turnover that the top teams have. We'll see which girls have the healthiest mentality to compete harder than ever at 16? My bet is on the girls that still love playing and have avoided the toxic movement and churning under coaches who are better at recruiting than building a team. I'm sure that's part of the plan too. The younger ecnl coaches recruit and the older ones actually know how to build and train a team.
Mostly true but there are ways that coaches can do both skills and strategy.
Like keeping the tempo of play up + forcing players to run full speed at all times during practice. The faster you go the more touches you get + the more concepts coaches can introduce / practice.
If the coach is slow + only verbally reviewing concepts while players are standing around listening it's not good.
Keep in mind that at the highest level especially later as they get older everyone is technical and tactical maybe some a little more than others but for the most part we see great athletes that have a solid technique. The difference now comes down to mental toughness. The ones that can endure the harsh criticisms and toxic environments early on will flourish later. Now this comes with the risk of burnout. But if they burnout then most likely they were not meant to play at the highest level anyways. Developing a strong mind is the differentiating factor among top athletes. Coaches need to focus on their team first over recruiting. I agree on that. A coach that solely focuses on recruiting is not the right coach at any level.