That is a really bitter and stupid thing to say. ECNL coaches and clubs direct 99 percent of their effort to developing players. The whole point of ECNL is to take the best players and make them even better, not to continue carrying the anchors who drag everyone else down either because they can’t or won’t develop like their peers. So many people at this site whine that youth soccer isn’t a meritocracy right up until they whine that it is.
Say bye-bye-bye to Girls and Boys DA
- Thread starter dreamz
- Start date
That is a really bitter and stupid thing to say. ECNL coaches and clubs direct 99 percent of their effort to developing players. The whole point of ECNL is to take the best players and make them even better, not to continue carrying the anchors who drag everyone else down either because they can’t or won’t develop like their peers. So many people at this site whine that youth soccer isn’t a meritocracy right up until they whine that it is.
And no chance ECNL drops anyone right now. They will only add.
Agree, if you're an ECNL club travel will be so much better
A coach tells his players they’d better step up their game during quarantine or someone else from the DA will get their spot and I’m bitter and stupid. Ok. But that coach is an ass. Nothing like causing his players to panic right now.
Day before Easter, probably wait until Monday would be more sensitive. However, every girl on a socal ecnl team needs to know competition is coming for the first time in a long time and not everyone can be "Elite." Some girls need to be told the truth that their spot will be gone if the don;t try harder. 03' and 04s better learn how to fight for time or college will be hell!!! This is the reality that this GDA league took away. 25% starts and development BS. That game is over. No promises anymore and most girls will do find playing all the time locally in the SCDSL or ECNL regional.
Haha! Maybe?
Can't tell if it sarcasm, but I can totally imagine the conversation.
Same talk can also begin, "I want to quit soccer."
foreveryoung
SILVER ELITE
Yes! Statically proven and exacerbated by RAE. One of the biggest obstacles in the US developing soccer players that can compete internationally.
Yes! We have basically over-organized and over-controlled the sh*t out of youth soccer and we think we are developing players but we are just creating robots.
If US soccer took half the money they spent on the DA and spent it on broad scouting, not just in urban areas and in certain leagues, they would be more effective in identifying players for the YNT than they have been with 10+ years of DA.
Dos Equis
GOLD
I am still waiting for tomorrow (and the announcement). Is that not a song -- "Tomorrow never comes"?
What many perceive as ECNL exclusivity is often ECNL loyalty -- they are very loyal to their member clubs. I highly doubt any club will be dropped for next season, no matter what happens.
As far as adding clubs, club history will matter. How Surf and RSC managed their departure from ECNL to DA will matter. How Legends and Beach handled their exclusion will also matter. It would not be retaliation to deny any club admittance, no matter how much success they have had, based on a prior bad experiences with that club.
But how nice would it be to have two ECNL SW brackets, a South bracket with Phoenix, San Diego and Southern OC, and a North bracket with the South Bay, LA, SF Valley/Camarillo, IE and Las Vegas.
foreveryoung
SILVER ELITE
You touched on another area - your socioeconomic status. We are never going to get the best players from the upper middle class of America - which are for the most part the kids playing DA and ECNL. These kids come from families that value higher education and are likely college bound and aren't looking for "a way out" of their circumstances which provides the hunger and drive that is necessary to persevere to the top level of play in sport. Upper middle class kids have a much easier path laid out for them. If you look at 99% of professional soccer players around the world you would see that they also came from humble backgrounds. It's a working class sport in every other country. In the UK, prestigious private schools don't even have soccer teams. They only play Rugby. Even with our best US players, Landon Donovan was raised by a single mother and had to walk/run to soccer practice. Dempsey was raised in a trailer park. Pulisic might not fit this category but as someone else said he's sort of a US anomaly anyway. Just another reason that broad scouting, outside of any leagues would serve US soccer much more than just looking within certain leagues of mostly upper middle class kids. Perhaps the fully funded MLS teams will help with this but they need to do broad scouting too. We have the talent in this country, we are just missing it by not seeing it at all, or by purging them with our short-sighted play to win strategy at the youth levels.
Surf is in trouble
I don’t really care whether you call it loyalty, retaliation, or monopolistic business practices. It is all the same.
Either it s a merit based system, or it is a smoke filled room. So far, both ECNL and DA have opted for smoke filled room every time they get a chance.
I was thinking that maybe this is one of the reasons that West Coast took back their old name.
Either ECNL doesn’t like surf. Or they weren’t going to allow 2 clubs with the same name within 35 miles of each other. (But I guess Slammers/LAFC slammers throws out this argument.).
Sombitch
SILVER ELITE
How so?
If they don’t get accepted back into ecnl. They went all in with DA so Surf Cup Sports could get the DA tournaments at polo fields.
If they do not get accepted back to ecnl, what will they do
futboldad1
PREMIER
Surf will be one of the few that get in.....but most DA clubs are in trouble as they haven't made a strong case to be included .....