Almost right - it was difficult for new teams to break into CSL Premier unless they were bringing a dozen or more other teams from their club who were willing to play in CSL lower divisions all over the area, with no home games.
SCDSL adding Discovery Division
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Almost right - it was difficult for new teams to break into CSL Premier unless they were bringing a dozen or more other teams from their club who were willing to play in CSL lower divisions all over the area, with no home games.
Is this a Pre-Academy Discovery League?
That and team continuity would cause teams to drop back down to bronze. The year my son played in CSL Bronze we had 3 teams that destroyed the bracket: 1 was a Silver team the previous year that was going to move to Gold, but lost too many players to keep continuity (although they retained all their stars), the other two teams were brand new to the league and legitimate Silver to Silver-Elite Teams (1 took the Presidents Cup championship ... skipped Governors altogether and a bronze team won Presidents). CSL's relegation/promotion model is/was broken when it comes to new teams or continuity. These flaws are one of the factors leading to the creation of the SCDSL.
One element that many do not appreciate is that there are competitive leagues trying really hard to break into the SoCal market, which up to this point has been controlled by two US Soccer affiliates (US Youth Soccer/Cal South and AYSO). The club scene is almost entirely dominated by Cal South, with the only legitimate incursion being US Club Soccer's ECNL, which recently expanded to boys.
We now have at least two leagues actively soliciting clubs that I know about:
- US Club Soccer's - National Premiere League (has a footprint for spring, but is trying to expand into fall).
- United Soccer League's (Div. II) - Super Y League (its youth league that operates on the east coast) and affiliated with the second level professional division.
This "discovery division" is that response and its features are a defensive maneuver to the leagues trying to breach the SoCal market, the ECNL (especially the new boys division - http://www.boysecnl.com/southwest-conference/) and the DPL, which is nothing more than a statement to the SoCal community that SCDSL top teams will now play in a new division called "discovery" that has some of these cool new features, so you clubs in the SDDA and CSL and those SCDSL teams thinking of jumping to US Club, bring your teams to SCDSL and come play in the Discovery Division (if you qualify).
Don't forget USL's Super-Y League --
http://www.sylsoccer.com/news_article/show/879512?referrer_id=2242489
I didn't, its point two above.
Desert Hound
DA
We even start training in August. It is a bit warm. But I tell you what, when us parents sit in the shade and have a drink I think we all survive just nicely. We make comments every now and then how the kids look a bit sweaty...but then we laugh and have another drink.
El Clasico
GOLD
Does this mean that SCDSL will allow a club to register teams in the Discovery league without having to bring all their teams over to "play in the lower divisions"? Or is it the same thing?
Not_that_Serious
GOLD
yes in a sense. think its the quickest way to try an implement something that gets leagues playing each other. im not a fan of limiting things to just one group. this wouldnt strengthen play from top to bottom in the leagues. for the interim, maybe this could be a first step. i doubt it would happen considering the politics and difference in philosophies involved. i talked to some flight1 coaches and felt as I did - promotes elitism. asked who gets in? who doesnt? brought up the point, as I did, no pro/rel in SCDS: so teams that dont perform well will always be included since they cant drop out - not like teams dont ever blow up. most said traveling to Norco every week isnt optimal since most dont solely coach the 1 or 2 elite teams in their clubs - nor do they want to. Bigger clubs have certain coaches training a couple top tier teams and dont deal with lower flights or even flight1 teams. Smaller clubs arent set up this way and coaches train all levels. Traveling would limit ability to coach more than a couple teams - with them for sure missing other team games. One coach has an entire age group (three teams) and has a team that would qualify for the circuit - but getting out to Norco would guarantee he would miss at least one game a week. He would have to drop a team and co-manage the age group. Not all clubs can afford to keep the coach's pay the same while picking up the cost of another coach training the team he dropped. From those who dont manage, coach or do any admin work, sounds like a decent idea. Some teams have kids who are on scholarship, one coach had at least 4 kids on scholarship and extra cost has to come from somewhere. Im sure some clubs will just hike the fees up and market it as some type of pre/reserve/almost there Academy. From admin side, causes a host of issues - some of it due to money. Which adds more to the have vs have-not system. Then we start getting into discussion of trying to field the best teams/talent (this after all is to promote development right?) or is this just another animal for clubs to make $
Not_that_Serious
GOLD
im sure other leagues would be fine with top teams leaving to play in another league. also, im sure SCDSL wants to promote teams they have within their own league. I dont see teams from outside coming in. Could be incorrect but looks like SCDSL teams only.
Good question.
The story we got from CSL is that if they let our team into Premier, that would mean not admitting a team that dozens of teams playing CSL lower divisions, so we would have to move in that direction.
I can’t see combined leagues happening due to politics. Even getting CSL and SCDSL to participate in one combined top division would be difficult, but IMO it just has to be done to stop the dilution of talent. I think combined divisions or leagues in lower flights is not important because there’s no talent to dilute, you can find mediocre bronze teams everywhere.
The first couple of years there’s going to be teams that don’t belong but that’s why I said there has to be promotion/relegation, so that worst teams get dropped and deserving teams that didn’t get in at the initial round get a shot.
The smaller teams just have to appoint an elite team coach who trains 2 or 3 elite teams in different age groups, so he can do one trip for all his teams.
Simisoccerfan
PREMIER
Pipe dream
Not_that_Serious
GOLD
the attitude most people take is what you expressed - a belief talent below flight 1 level isnt important. which i and many dont feel is true.
A) kids dont become upper level talent through wishing. They need to be developed. focus is on fastest and strongest kids. you see this all the way up to sr usnmt. its a philosophy that comes all the way from the top to the bottom levels. This is why we are so far behind in soccer compared to most of the world.
B) The Elite team coaching staff ties into the same belief system. Talk to most of these coaches and its almost like its beneath them to even touch even a non DA or ECNL or Premier team. You can google the statistics (or search twitter) and see where kids who are on the National teams come from - a handful of kids coming out of these programs in the area. You have to start from the bottom and increase the talent pool via development. We are too worried about ulittles but we still have to wait until kids hit mid-teens to see how they will be physically - before then, should worry more about technical issues. Hard to do when club system is setup to be mercenary. I understand its hard to develop kids at lower levels, but good coaches have the ability to do that - most might even enjoy it
A.PT2) You can find medicore teams from ECNL to Flight 1 to Bronze/Flight 3. Kids have to start somewhere. Never seen a kid roll off the playground on to a top flight team. They can have the physical tools but need a place to figure out speed of play and learn how to play. Have kids at flight 1 and elite teams who still run in straight lines and think soccer is smash, take ball, go forward, lose ball, go win ball, repeat cycle. Regardless of leagues are selling, development isnt the focus. Creating talent takes time. See kids rolling into flight 3 and getting into good flight 1 teams in 2-3 years. That isnt a bad window of time. If we ignored those kids/teams, we limit our player pool potential. Again, part of why we have national soccer issues. If you get to kids early enough, the window leads into teen years, where kids level out. We put too much emphasis on u11, u12,u13 but these kids havent hit there physical maturity. Should be making sure their technical ability is maximized vs worrying about flights. Improve play down to bottom will only improve higher levels of play - which I think everyone has agreed can be poor.
Given all that. Yes their is obvious advantage of playing the best competition. Just have to make sure all the teams playing one another are the top teams - and have ability to remove poor performing teams. Also needs to be initiatives to improve lower flight play. Removing the best comp from flight 1 will have a consequence. I just believe you cant focus on one group, with most coaches wanting an entire team of "great" players. Given the limits of the talent pool, you often have to create good players. wish there was a good solution. think there is as we have discussed, but I agree, money and politics get in the way.
You need a certain very high base level of athleticism to be a legitimate academy player. If you take a bunch of OK athletes and train them up you will end up with a below average flight 1 team. Not That Serious approach seems to be cast a wide net and train all the kids, and the wider net will catch more elite kids. The problem with that approach is that there are limited numbers of quality coaches, and frankly it’s a waste of the best coaches time to train kids with low ceilings.
IMO the level of coaching has to, on avg., get a lot better before you can take “cast the wide net” approach. There are so many crap coaches out there, the few good coaches have to be assigned to the best players.
IMO the level of coaching has to, on avg., get a lot better before you can take “cast the wide net” approach. There are so many crap coaches out there, the few good coaches have to be assigned to the best players.
Not_that_Serious
GOLD
I dont agree with the assessment they have to be very high level athletic. Athletic yes, but elite? Also hard to measure the quality. I wouldnt put a lot of professional defenders and even some mids in that category.
You are 100% on the need for better coaches, but some of these coaches with the resumes cant coach a lick either. Dont think anyone can argue against that. As far as a waste of time, that is up to personal philosophy. Guess it also depends on figuring who the best coaches are. Also have to factor in what is getting taught. Thats another rabbit hole.
So you are of the mind that they don't need to be athletic to be a high level athlete?
That's not what he said. Correct me if I'm wrong here NTS, but believe you are saying that hyper athletes are not the answer to US Soccer's problems and lack of competitiveness on the international stage.So you are of the mind that they don't need to be athletic to be a high level athlete?
A certain level in the key athletic qualities (size, speed, agility, strength, stamina, etc...) are necessary to be an elite pro/int'l level soccer player, but the sport is more art than science. So much of the game is about the 6-inches between the ears. I do think you need to be "athletic enough" to execute and I believe every position requires a different baseline of each of those attributes. What would be considered "enough" is the real debate here. I know I don't have the answer.
Let me give you a real world example. My son’s 03 academy team had the best technical coach in the club, except for the director. His team was filled with a bunch of highly athletic, flashy skilled, technically deficient in passing/receiving, stupid, selfish players. This coach did an incredible job fixing a lot of the stupid and the passing/receiving skills. He couldn’t fix the selfish and there was a certain level of residual stupid.
The club then moved him to the 04s, who were all right footed only, high soccer IQ, ok speed, no size or strength, great touch, great at passing and moving.
Both teams ended up sucking. The difference was that the 2 or 3 special athletes on the 03s, after getting coached by a top notch coach, were playing great. Nobody was playing great on the 04s. The 04s were losing because they had no talent that could win them games, they’d spin the ball around until a top athlete on the other team stripped them and shredded their D. The 03s lost because the few special athletes couldn’t score enough goals to make up for the giveaways of the donkeys on the team who were under the illusion they were good because there was an academy patch on their shirt.
Result, just about the entire 04 team was cut. They were a waste of time and coaching resources. About half the 03 team was cut.
I completely disagree with your democratic approach. There are a limited number of top coaches, there are limited number of top teams, there are limited number of spots on top teams. Elite coaches and players should be together. Elite coaches can’t turn average into great. Mixing donkey and superstars leads to a losing team.
ECNL teams wouldn't necessarily need to leave that circuit. SCDSL could give them credit for local ECNL games against the other ECNL-SCDSL teams as if they were SCDSL Discovery division games. Then they'd just have to find time to play the non-ECNL teams in Discovery (admittedly difficult depending on how many teams are involved). ECNL teams play non-ECNL teams all the time in tournaments. So it seems at least possible.