100%. Me and my little girl was told by a British Doc, "High school soccer is horrible. You can't play in the Girls Development (Grooming) Academy and do High School soccer." My buddy had an All-American Water polo player at Laguna that made the YNT and got a full ride to Cal and he was able to do both. I was shocked when Doc told me under no circumstances are the girls allowed to do both. We followed the rules and guess what? Well, this lying sack of shit Doc was told by his bosses that their daughters also wanted to do both, like my little one. These smart asses got together and figured out a way for their rich kids to have their cake and ice cream. They got the top brace at the now closed GDA to give a waiver to the rich kids at private schools. I know I repeat this story over and over but it's worth repeating because these punks will pay for their deceit and lies. I know Larz hates it when I bring this crap up but I'm still waiting for them to say sorry. My little one was the leader of the #1 team in the country and she did what she wanted to do. When this went down, I thought the Doc was joking at first and then I could see through the wolfs eyes that this was all about control and business. If a kid plays soccer 24/7 then mommy and daddy will pay all year around. No other sports either so all the rich parents' money stay in the soccer hub. You MUST play soccer soccer soccer soccer only and pay pay pay pay the man or else. I think both and, is the way to go, not either or.
Get ready folks
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It's easier to lie if you have an accent.
Paco Amigo
BRONZE
Different era. HS soccer was the main pathway to college at that time, and much of the YNT recruiting came from a combination of state HS tournaments, NPL play as well as ODP.
None of those things are relevant anymore for elite football. So it’s not reasonable to look at a bygone era as a guidepost for what could be better in today’s environment. The quality of play today is significantly better than Donovan’s era. And Pele today wouldn’t even be in the pool for Brazil’s NT.
You must be a club coach. The US doesn't have "elite football", that's a dream being sold to parents. Yes, of course, players today are better than they were 20 years ago when Landon was in high school. The same goes for all sports. However, the US as an international power hasn't gained any ground on other countries in terms of developing players. We have a few more players playing internationally, but many of those players developed overseas. Any improvement is immaterial, despite the fact that we have significantly more youth playing soccer than any other country.
Prohibiting players from playing high school has done nothing to improve development of US players. Will playing HS soccer improve development? No, probably not, but let the kids enjoy some glory at their school and community, away from the grind of so-called "elite" Club soccer. Make HS soccer relevant again, and lets stop pretending that MLS Next is "elite football".
I haven't watched the whole thing, but the part on the reasons for youth soccer dropout rates is spot on. Its no longer fun at 14 and more about a coaches ego than anything else.
Paco just joined the forum. Let's all give him a warm welcome. The fact is the Docs and guys like Coach Paco say they can develop players to be elite, which is complete bullshit. One liar told me to my face that if my kid plays HS Soccer, she will be taken off the list. I told him to take a hike jack. Dude laughed at me, told me I'm making a big mistake and will regret not forcing my daughter to play year-round soccer. My kid went on and lettered all 4 years, played Volleyball, ran track and most importantly, she had fun. Was it worth it? Hell, ya it was. Was it dangerous at times because the refs suck in high school soccer, yes. These coaches sell this lie, and some make close to $200K a year by selling parents 24/7 soccer, 365 days a year with elite private practices for those who can afford it. $25K a year if your team is lucky to make the playoffs. 90% of these kids are not elite in the true sense. Their just good players and some can hang. I played basketball and the basketball gods don't lie to kids like me. 5 5' as a 10th grader. I did grow to 5 9'. High School sports rock. Now, if you are one of the special players we some high level skilz, then maybe it's not best to play high school soccer. Fix the ref issues, get some funding, some good coaches and you can have serious fun and good soccer.
Paco Amigo
BRONZE
Warm welcome received.
I don’t disagree with the assessment of US Soccer. And the point I’m making if still stands, different era, different pathway. Not saying we have it figured out. BUT, the old HS first pathway of Donovan’s era sure wasn’t it. And our current pathway is closer aligned to the British pathway, but obviously still not close enough.
What I would suggest is that the next big milestone for US Soccer is actually coaching knowledge and experience. US Coaches are, on the whole, awful and ignorant. We need richer, deeper, more experienced coaches up and down the ladder. I think the hiring of Emma and Mauricio are great steps, even if they don’t work out, I’m hopeful that the desire to bring and pay for better coaching at the top creates a waterfall down to the youth level.
Hahaha.Warm welcome received.
I don’t disagree with the assessment of US Soccer. And the point I’m making if still stands, different era, different pathway. Not saying we have it figured out. BUT, the old HS first pathway of Donovan’s era sure wasn’t it. And our current pathway is closer aligned to the British pathway, but obviously still not close enough.
What I would suggest is that the next big milestone for US Soccer is actually coaching knowledge and experience. US Coaches are, on the whole, awful and ignorant. We need richer, deeper, more experienced coaches up and down the ladder. I think the hiring of Emma and Mauricio are great steps, even if they don’t work out, I’m hopeful that the desire to bring and pay for better coaching at the top creates a waterfall down to the youth level.
You sound exactly like DA when it first hit the scene.
Coaching doesn't matter when youth clubs and USYNT play with substitution rules while colleges play with unlimited subs. The different styles of play force coaches to recruit different types of players and coach teams in different ways.
You can't arbitrary "teach" coaches how to coach and expect them to do things that don't translate to wins.
if you want to see soccer in the US improve all the different leagues and levels need to play the same game with the same rules. When this happens coaching will align and players that move forward from a young age will always be the best for a certain style of play.
Thatonedad
SILVER
As a parent getting a knowledgeable coach with experience sounds expensive. How many families can afford that.Warm welcome received.
I don’t disagree with the assessment of US Soccer. And the point I’m making if still stands, different era, different pathway. Not saying we have it figured out. BUT, the old HS first pathway of Donovan’s era sure wasn’t it. And our current pathway is closer aligned to the British pathway, but obviously still not close enough.
What I would suggest is that the next big milestone for US Soccer is actually coaching knowledge and experience. US Coaches are, on the whole, awful and ignorant. We need richer, deeper, more experienced coaches up and down the ladder. I think the hiring of Emma and Mauricio are great steps, even if they don’t work out, I’m hopeful that the desire to bring and pay for better coaching at the top creates a waterfall down to the youth level.
It's $25K now a year to get this kind of coaching and access to what coach, the Doc and club can get your child. I know many of the British Docs arrived back in 2015. They came by the plane load and got jobs in youth soccer because of their accent. I dealt with two of them. I'm not saying all, but many came because of the pay, the power and the ladies.
I don't disagree with much of what you have to say, particularly about the quality of coaching. Although I'd say arrogance is their biggest problem. (Ironically, they may be US coaches, but many are foreign born). When we're talking about "elite" players that is an incredibly small number of players. I'd say in SD County that's probably 1-2 kids per age group (I'm talking boys), I can only think of one in the 2007 age group. Why prevent the majority of other kids from playing High School soccer? An MLS Next kid by the time they reach 15 has most likely been playing year round soccer for at least 5 years and many for 9 years. Playing 3 months out of the year with your HS friends isn't going to set back their development, and actually might be a welcome break from the club grind.Warm welcome received.
I don’t disagree with the assessment of US Soccer. And the point I’m making if still stands, different era, different pathway. Not saying we have it figured out. BUT, the old HS first pathway of Donovan’s era sure wasn’t it. And our current pathway is closer aligned to the British pathway, but obviously still not close enough.
What I would suggest is that the next big milestone for US Soccer is actually coaching knowledge and experience. US Coaches are, on the whole, awful and ignorant. We need richer, deeper, more experienced coaches up and down the ladder. I think the hiring of Emma and Mauricio are great steps, even if they don’t work out, I’m hopeful that the desire to bring and pay for better coaching at the top creates a waterfall down to the youth level.
aong cangkol
SILVER
If you don't have time, the first 10min have spot on observation on US youth soccer problems.
It's amazing that these foreigners can understand US youth soccer scene.
Maybe it is not that complex after all. There is no intention to fix it at all from the leadership and definitely not from the clubs.
UK is a capitalist society, but English FA seems to always involve and really try to improve youth soccer development.
They basically sum up the problem in one word with out saying it explicitly, "joysticking".
What they claim in the first 10 minutes describes the problem being the pay to play win only & structured/Joysticking type of training that we have in the USA along with the lack of a pickup culture which looks for athletes first and this structure aims to create robotic non creative players. They highlight the fact that in the USA we use an American football type of model with cones to develop players vs a free flow soccer model that South American countries use with pickup soccer. The increase of American football coaches/trainers trying to teach a sport they never played themselves using American football tactics & techniques to teach soccer has become a problem. The other part is a culture problem. We do not have a pick up soccer culture like we do in basketball. If we were to fix these few things we would potentially start to fix things.
I wonder how much influence the "pay to play" model has on the "win now" and bring home "trophies from tournaments" mentality?
Karlton Athletic
SILVER
Really interesting video, especially as someone who grew up playing in England (and for a few years, South America), but have my own kids now growing up in the US. I'd often wished I'd had the tactical coaching my kids are getting, but at the same time I had this nagging worry that they never got to play for fun - to express themselves without being shouted at by a coach, something this video really reinforced.
My solution (alongside them playing at school lunchtimes) was a futsal league, and now they're a little older, to join my pickup game with grownups (because my love of the game wasn't coached out of me, LOL) and its now their and my favorite day of the week.
This is the perfect example of what’s wrong with USA training… here you have a football 
trainer trying to teach kids 
️ the comments in this post say it all 
trainer trying to teach kids ️ the comments in this post say it all I think this also plays a major role because like they claimed in this video… If kids do not know how to play 3v3 how then do they progress and learn to play 5v5, 7v7, 9v9 & 11v11 ? If we only focus on winning when they are young how are we teaching kids the fundamentals. If you look at most players in the pay to play system they do not have the fundamentals down.
Kidneys go for a couple hundred a piece. That's why there's so many Porta-Potties at Surf & Silverlakes.
This is also part of the problem. Getting knowledgeable coaches and trainers I would add. The one thing I noticed in Texas was the poor training they offer there. It’s basically football
coaches trying to teach soccer. One of the reasons we moved to California was for better training but it comes at a cost 