I take solace in the fact that within 3 years, my son will be out of the club soccer regardless, and I probably won't be around if/when they need to deal with that. My goal is to have him have fun, get good training/practice, and help him try to achieve his potential (as long as he remains interested in and happy playing soccer). I feel like (at least in my case), we should be able to get an appropriate level of college coach exposure (relative to his skill level), even with playing EA2; for me, it's more just about getting level competition level, and limiting travel for little value. My personal perspective, anyway.
Socal named as Operator for National 1 League
- Thread starter shankbone
- Start date
There won't be relegation/promotion! Its too big a ship to steer with having each age group - fields/refs/logistics. I guess a entire club's teams could be relegated?
But good points about the disparity. Here's a couple of more
Top 2013 Girls ECNL team is +32 GD and worst is -38 GD (13 games)
Top 2013 Girls NL team is +59 GD and worst is -11
The 2013 Girls DPL is crazier but they do a ratio in the standings to hide it.
Code
GOLD
Thanks for the elaboration on the point of my post. Keep up the good work,
.
Code
GOLD
Agreed.
Code
GOLD
You have to be keen when someone says ECRL, because of the new ECRL SoCal league they rolled out. Which is not even close to ECRL. N1, NPL, DPL, E64, ECRL SoCal are all basically the same tier, and all these teams should be playing in the same local league, no need to travel out of you region to play competitive teams. But, Leagues and Clubs want to make money. ECNL=GA, maybe a slight edge toward ECNL. ECRL=GA Aspire, with a strong edge toward ECRL, for now.Sporting told their families the girls playing NPL last year would all be in N1. They also said N1 is higher than DPL and it's the same as aspire and ECRL? I am confused.
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The lack of promotion/relegation in any of these leagues is the reason there are so many different leagues. Everyone can just claim "Elite", but no one has to prove it.
Code
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^this
. The only way we get there is by informing the new parents getting into youth sports. We have to stop supporting (joining and paying money) these clubs participating in all these side leagues.
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Promotion/Relegation can work. SOCAL league had it up and running well 6-8 years ago. But the clubs who had a lot of teams being relegated, or being fined for not providing quality fields and refs on game day got upset. This is when all the copycat letter leagues started popping up; the poor performing clubs started banding together to make alternate "elite" league options. Then the big dogs started making additional tiered leagues to grab a piece of that pie(EA, Aspire, ECRL SoCal). It all worked because parents won't tell the clubs no.
dad/coachDA
BRONZE
LOL ECNL and GA are not the same not even close...... ECRL is pretty much GA.... Aspire just started but is equal to DPL..
Depends on which teams you're talking about.
dad/coachDA
BRONZE
i believe they where talking about G2013. Rankings: top 10 teams in CA ECNL: 8 GA: 1..... I'm sure its like this at all 6 age groups (11v11)
Aspire is run by DPL for GA and is a re-name job. But there is room for growth.
Sorry - I was talking specifically about ENCNL and ECRL. Socal league didn't have promotion and relegation up and running - Coast did! But one of the reasons given for leaving Coast was promotion and relegation - the old precursor to Socal SDSCL specifically let coaches (to some degree) pick their flight - that was one of the big appeals.
Don't feel like its all on the parents telling clubs no. Parents fomo is definitely a big factor but so much of the alphabet soup just confuses parents - most just want their kid to play on a "good" team.
Sounds about right.
For top 25 - here's the split Norcal/Socal:
Norcal: 8 teams (5 ECNL, 1 ECRL, 2 GA)
Socal: 17 teams (10 ECNL, 1 ECRL, 3 GA, 1 DPL, 1 NL, 1 INDY)
I don't think anybody is going to argue that Surf, Koge, Slammers, Blues and Beach are all top 10 programs across all age groups. Most likely Legends as well. That's all orange county and Surf.
Code
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SOCAL had Promotion/Relegation up and running for a couple years. After they changed names from SDSCL. It was the only way into NPL after the first year of it existence. Coast had a much better system, because it was across all levels, not just the Tier 1 and Tier 2 groups.
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Talking about all age groups.
dad/coachDA
BRONZE
its like this in all age groups. ECNL and GA are not the same. ECNL is way higher.
Unless your kid plays on a high level team it doesn't matter.
Shankbone, your post highlights what's wrong with the "club based" system; teams don't play one another, nor do they play teams from outside their "closed" league. You are guessing at who the best teams are. Club based teams fear playing teams in open leagues like CSL because losing brings down the curtain that they are often charging too much. The ecosystem needs reimagining to allow the opportunity to identify the best players, teams, coaches, and clubs, not just to guess.
RandomSoccerFan
PREMIER
Anyone classifying SR rankings as "guessing" at how a particular US youth soccer team performs, doesn't have the first clue about how to judge the relative strength of soccer teams - strength being defined as a higher-ranked team expected to beat a lower-ranked team in a game.