A kid on the 2010 team told me he hated E64 and his AYSO United team. He was going to bail on both ASAP
How's that Elite 64 League going?
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I went back and read the Elite 64, ECNL, and GA rules. If you read the E64 League rules there is no "team" roster to lock or roster size restrictions within their own club. The clubs are completely free to move any and all players in the club onto the roster each week. That is the intended concept of the E64 League, Club Player Pool vs Club Player Pool. Clubs can adjust the rosters using all available players in an age group, allowing the club flexiblity in developing players across all their teams with additional playtime, and positional experiements in a competitive game environment. Not Dedicated Team from the Club vs. Dedicated Team from another Club (Locked Rosters for season, ie ECNL/GA). There are a lot of clubs running dedicated teams for E64 and E64 only. Which is completly incognizant of the intended E64 product. If a team is only playing in E64 games throughout the year, those players are being disadvantaged. Every team on every E64 club should be playing in an additional (Primary) League, either MLS/EA/ECNL/RL/GA/DPL or NPL. If your clubs are not using the product correctly, maybe you should ask them to read the rule book before Highschool season is over.
Dale Earnhardt Jr Jr
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Dale Earnhardt Jr Jr
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This 100%. Great post.
It creates two issues however. One is that some of the clubs doing e64 are the ones locked out of mls ecnl. Ideally it would be a place where the bench and reserve players from these teams would have a chance to get some extra playtime. But some of the teams there just don’t have the opportunity of getting to that high level so they are using e64 as a surrogate.
the other issue is the scheduling since between travel and showcases it’s tough for ecnl mls and ea players to do e64 on top of that. Hence why we are probably seeing reports of e64 players also helping out on lower level teams (they are e64 first but get to help out on other teams). If you need to rely on 1 team to do e64 that is also doing SoCal and state cup, that’s some awful hard scheduling. the Big clubs just don’t operate that way. They are all little fiefdoms run by coaches as their feudal lord. While they would be glad to receive a player up above to help them win their lower league, they’d be infuriated to cost them a league game by losing a better player to another coach.
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E64 is just not designed to be the same type of product as MLS or ECNL. If clubs are trying to use it as a surrogate league for dedicated teams, then they are going to be disappointed. It is clearly a Player Pool supplement for clubs with multiple teams in an age group. Of course MLS and ECNL teams are not going to participate, they don't need too. As you pointed out, the schedule for those leagues are already demanding, these teams are playing about 30 games a year with League play and Events (not counting tournaments).
E64 is targeting clubs who have top teams in NPL, and Flight 1, and Flight 2. The SOCAL teams only have 10 games scheduled for league in Fall, and a few State Cup games in spring. E64 would be easy to fit into these teams schedules, especially if you have a pool of 40-50 players. And if you look at the schedule of E64 games played, it is clear a lot of clubs are doing this because most of their games are scheduled for spring. The clubs who are using E64 as intended are getting to play dedicated teams in SOCAL NPL/Flight 1 and get to travel and play different clubs throughout the year. I think that scenario would be tempting to join; NPL teams could pull some MLS/ECNL player back to fold.
E64 players helping out on SOCAL teams is against the SOCAL rules. Club pass between teams can only occur if the player is Primarily rostered on a SOCAL team. If they are Primarily rostered on a team in a different league (MLS, ECNL, EA, E64), and play with a SOCAL team, the teams game would be forfeit and the club fined for each occurrence. Wouldn't be hard to prove.
This is the benefit of not having a dedicated E64 team. Roster every player as a Primary on a SOCAL team, all E64 rosters are secondary. No rule violation, max flexibility to club pass all players at the club onto the SOCAL rosters, complete freedom to use player pool for E64 rosters each game. You don't need a dedicated E64 coach for each age group either, use the entire coaching staff to mitigate scheduling conflicts, and developmental diversity. Smaller clubs running business this way, can compete with the Big Club feifdoms. Which is what I think US Youth Soccer had in mind when they created the E64 concept.
Not really. CSL is just a shell of what is left over after all the good clubs left. Promotion or not, there's just no strong teams left at most age groups.
E64 has some very good teams, but also some weak ones (AYSO United, for instance and the thrid or fourth-tier teams from the big clubs) that seem to be there so that the league could get to the 64 teams they promised they would have.
What are you talking about? On the boys end pacific ayso United is top side of the table in 2, mid table in 4, bottom in 1 of the teams I looked up. Like many of the bigger clubs they seem top or bottom depending on year and team.
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Boys side only has 59 clubs participating. Girls side only has 56 clubs participating. So they haven't yet found 64 clubs looking to play. What "big" clubs have teams participating? Looking at most of the teams in the Pacific division girls side, the teams look to be from affiliates, not the main club. Which in reality, are separate clubs. For example, East County Surf is not Surf. Those EC Surf teams are the clubs first teams. The Legends teams appear to be from the Legends Santa Clarita Valley affiliate, not the Legends club from Norco, so most likely, Legends SCV first teams. Slammers teams look to be from CDA Slammers Fullerton. I don't know how all the clubs up in LA are organized/affiliated, so I could be wrong, but I'm not sure any of the "big" clubs are actually participating in E64. It seems as though the teams with the "big" club names are just affiliate clubs from other areas, that have been really vague about the club name. If anyone is aware of a specific club playing their third or fourth team in E64 I would like to be corrected.
Hmmmm, ok, maybe they fooled me. I'd also be interested in hearing whether any big club teams are actually playing E64.
As for AYSO United, the teams are - for the most part - weak. Where they are near the top in their divisions, it speaks to a very weak division. Thanks for clarifying.
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I'm with ya. It's hard to figure out where these teams actually play, and what other leagues they are or are not playing in. Some club websites are up to date, and you can see who is coaching what team, and then easily figure out where the E64 team came from. Other's, who knows. I think maybe LASC and some of the East Coast/Midwest teams may be from the source clubs, but I to am hoping someone can chime in.
There are 4 clubs that are weaker than AYSO United in the E64 Pacific Divisions in terms of average position in standings.
There isn't a single AYSO United team in last place in their division.
There are 2 clubs with 3 teams each in last place in their divisions.
If AYSO United is weak, then Las Vegas Surf, Laguna United, LAUFA and FC Premier are all weaker.
| Club | Average Position in E64 Standings | |
1 | South Valley Surf | 2.5 |
2 | CDA Slammers Elite | 3.5 |
3 | Legends FC | 3.8 |
4 | Los Angeles Soccer Club | 4.3 |
5 | East County Surf | 4.4 |
6 | Strikers FC North | 4.6 |
7 | AYSO United | 5.3 |
8 | Las Vegas Surf | 5.8 |
9 | Laguna United FC | 6.2 |
10 | LA United Futbol Academy | 7.2 |
11 | FC Premier | 7.3 |
Male U13 - 13U Boys Pacific
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Male U14 - 14U Boys Pacific
Schedule Results View PDF
Male U15 - 15U Boys Pacific
Schedule Results View PDF
Male U16 - 16U Boys Pacific
Schedule Results View PDF
Male U17 - 17U Boys Pacific
Schedule Results View PDF
Male U19 - 19U Boys Pacific
Schedule Results View PDF
Female U13 - 13U Girls Pacific
Schedule Results View PDF
Female U14 - 14U Girls Pacific
Schedule Results View PDF
Female U15 - 15U Girls Pacific
Schedule Results View PDF
Female U16 - 16U Girls Pacific
Schedule Results View PDF
Female U17 - 17U Girls Pacific
Schedule Results View PDF
Female U19 - 19U Girls Pacific
Schedule Results View PDF
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Firet, before I point this out, I'm not implying AYSO United is weak, I actually think they are pretty good. I do have to point out that some of these teams have only played 1 or 2 games, most have 3-5 games, and others have played 8. The rankings and points might show a trend for the highest and lowest performing clubs right now. But it is going to change a lot once all the teams have played the same amount of games. With such a wide variation in the games played, I would expect significant changes in points and rankings once play starts again.
And here is the other weird part about the league that could impact standings, the teams are basically aggregators, they can sign whoever whenever pretty much, so Superstar Susie or Joe available on a couple weekends, presto, a team has completely different results one weekend to the next.
justabystander
BRONZE
Let me provide a non-SoCal perspective. Our club has always been a nationally competitive club; boys did DA when it was a thing and girls are in GA. The city got awarded the MLS pro team and our club partnered with them. The MLS pro team has the MLS Next team and they draw 4-5 players in each age group of our club and they recruit nationally for rest of roster, so we dont do MLS next for the high school ages. Our club hosts these nation wide pool of players in local homes that play for the MLS pro team's MLS next team. Our team lost to the MLS next team 2-1 and also to the other MLS pro team's MLS next team that is about an hour an half away, also 2-1. We also beat the top teams in the ECNL conference that is in our area when we do non-conference friendlies.
The problem is we are kind of stuck. Club has a partnership with the local MLS Pro team and the parents deduce that we wont do ECNL because of our MLS partnership. A lot of teams in our state and surrounding states joined ECNL, but these were all the weak teams that couldn't compete anywhere else. Most of those weak teams went ECRL, but also some went to the ECNL conference. We are better than the majority of those teams and we play non-conference games against them. One of the weakest clubs from our USYS regional league last year was accepted for ECNL - wow!
So the club doesnt do high school age MLS next and it doesnt do ECNL. NL Pro last year had quality teams. E64 comes around and many of the good NL Pro teams from last year jumped ship and joined MLS Next or ECNL. So now we are in E64 and the competition is weak and watching NL Pro that is even weaker.
We have two other kids that play NCAA D1 and D3. I talked to one of their coaches at the Orlando showcase and they were underwhelmed. I talked to another college coach (D1) from my town that coaches at my daughter's club when she was in high school and he too says this was all underwhelming. Our team is crushing conference teams and teams from other conferences (in Orlando). USYS really ruined and diluted talent when it split the National League to NL Pro to NL Pro and E64. Also, it only has 61 teams - I call it E61. Every team has to go to the playoffs in Oceanside next year regardless of what they place in their conference. The top two teams from each conference will play for the E64 title in a Tier 1 playoff. Tier 2 will be all the third and fourth place teams; Tier 3 fifth and sixth; Tier 4 seventh and eighth. What a waste of time and money to travel for a week to California is a team is in Tier 2-4.
So to sum it all up - very disappointed. We feel duped by USYS. Most teams are weak. There is probably 5 teams +/- a handful that are quality.
The problem is we are kind of stuck. Club has a partnership with the local MLS Pro team and the parents deduce that we wont do ECNL because of our MLS partnership. A lot of teams in our state and surrounding states joined ECNL, but these were all the weak teams that couldn't compete anywhere else. Most of those weak teams went ECRL, but also some went to the ECNL conference. We are better than the majority of those teams and we play non-conference games against them. One of the weakest clubs from our USYS regional league last year was accepted for ECNL - wow!
So the club doesnt do high school age MLS next and it doesnt do ECNL. NL Pro last year had quality teams. E64 comes around and many of the good NL Pro teams from last year jumped ship and joined MLS Next or ECNL. So now we are in E64 and the competition is weak and watching NL Pro that is even weaker.
We have two other kids that play NCAA D1 and D3. I talked to one of their coaches at the Orlando showcase and they were underwhelmed. I talked to another college coach (D1) from my town that coaches at my daughter's club when she was in high school and he too says this was all underwhelming. Our team is crushing conference teams and teams from other conferences (in Orlando). USYS really ruined and diluted talent when it split the National League to NL Pro to NL Pro and E64. Also, it only has 61 teams - I call it E61. Every team has to go to the playoffs in Oceanside next year regardless of what they place in their conference. The top two teams from each conference will play for the E64 title in a Tier 1 playoff. Tier 2 will be all the third and fourth place teams; Tier 3 fifth and sixth; Tier 4 seventh and eighth. What a waste of time and money to travel for a week to California is a team is in Tier 2-4.
So to sum it all up - very disappointed. We feel duped by USYS. Most teams are weak. There is probably 5 teams +/- a handful that are quality.
justabystander
BRONZE
I think you are right. Looking at standings from conferences that have played a majority of their games and the scores are all over the place. Many teams show inconsistent results and it makes me wonder if they are fielding a different team each week.
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It sounds like your club is getting the short end of the stick in your MLS Partnership arrangement. Your club is taking on the cons (locked out of certain leagues) of being an MLS Next Club, but not the pros (talent attraction of players and coaches). The players from your club who are good enough to make the MLS Next team would probably have made the team even without the partnership. I don't think USYS had intentions for the clubs that joined to run dedicated teams in only the E64 the entire year. The rules just don't support that strategy. It is designed to either be a supplemental league for high level teams, or a club pool play system without dedicated teams. USYS certainly could have made it clear that it was not going to be a Tier 1 League, when they failed to add more than a handful of Tier 1 teams into the league. I hope your club finds something at the appropriate level for the players. Some clubs in SOCAL are splitting into "separate" organizations so they can have an MLS Next program and other programs.
justabystander
BRONZE
I can definitely see how could see E64 as supplemental, but their words on their webpage describing E64:
"Elite 64 is US Youth Soccer National League’s ‘Elite Performance Tier,’ which is the pinnacle of soccer in the United States, providing a never-before-seen experience that enhances a player’s recruitment into the college and professional game"
"Elite 64 is building player and recruitment pathways never before seen in the youth soccer landscape of the United States Elite 64 provides to each player all the tools they need to not only develop, but to also take the next steps toward recruitment at the collegiate level, professional level, or international level. "
"As the name suggests, Elite 64 is made up of top 64 boys clubs and top 64 girls clubs in the United States, all striving to be the best by competing with the best."
These words are not words used for a supplemental league. The message that is being sent by USYS is that this is a Tier 1 League. Evenso, our club still does really well with college recruitment and our director is nationally known and well respected. My son's team was "ranked" ahead of all but two MLS teams and beat an ECNL national finalist in an age group above theirs during a friendly. 12 of 22 players went D1, 3 went to ranked D3 teams as a personal choice for school and location, and 7 didn't want to play anymore after high school - I'd say they did alright with college recruitment.
My concern lies more for my second son in high school now. The E64 Orlando showcase quickly demonstrated to college coaches how underwhelming the league is. Like I posted before, there are a handful of quality teams in our age group, but the majority of teams not what we thought the competition would be like. Eventually the college coach attendance lists will get smaller and smaller as more E64 games are watched. I am really annoyed with USYS for selling this E64 bit.
The bigger problem is that MLS Next and ECNL are expanding so much that everyone is "elite". There are close to 100 teams in the MLS Next age group for my son and who knows how many for ECNL - probably similar number. MLS Next added 24 clubs in 21-22 and 8 more in 22-23. Many teams also went to ECNL. So suddenly these teams that couldn't get out of state cup group play are now considered to be the "elite" players the next year because their club joined MLS Next or ECNL.
My daughter's club coach who was also the D1 coach for the university in town would always say these leagues keeping adding to teams to their "elite" league that now everyone is considered "elite". Anyway, now I'm just venting. Thanks for reading if you read this far.