The right choice?

O

Outlier

BRONZE
There is a lot of talk on this forum that ALL the talent in 03 and 04 is going DA and that is simply NOT true. My player and several of her teammates turned down DA offers and chose either ECNL or to play up on a top older team at an unaffiliated club with great coaching. Here were my player's reasons:

1) She feels staying on honor roll makes her a more desirable college recruit and wants the flexibility to schedule her extra training on days when it works best with her homework load.
2) She saw her cousin quit soccer entirely after three years of boys DA - he was burned out.
3) With politics and homegrown players dominating some DA programs, coupled with substitution rules, she was concerned about playing time.
4) She asked the question "If all the DA teams are training the same way and only playing other DA teams how are they going to learn to deal with the adversity of teams that play in unexpected ways?"
5) Stand out players will always have opportunities.

The point is not only to listen to your player but to have the confidence to make the right choice for your kid whether it's DA or something else. It's difficult to buck a trend - we had to try hard not to be swept along with the DA tide. Nothing against DA - its just that there are multiple ways to get to college soccer and we all know the odds are against most of our girls making a national team. It's a big country with thousands of girls competing for a very small roster.
 
100% agree with your post. US Soccer and the clubs that got DAs want you to believe otherwise and score people into compliance but the reality is DA on the girls side will change very little. My daughters were both on A-teams at Surf and neither want DA as they want to play in high school like their three older nieces who both turned down DA to stick with their club teams. If you have a good coach, good team mates and facilities I can't see why one would change. But parents love the shiny new toy...until the next one comes along.
 
Playing time for my DD is important. IF she were on a DA team and was 1-11...fantastic. If you are 18-22 or so...you are not getting much playing time. If that were the case I would put her somewhere where she can play...and have fun....which is why she plays. It goes without saying I want her on a good team with good coaching. But in the end...she has to have fun. Sitting on the bench would drive her nuts.
 
Funny I was just wondering who the new Make a Play vs Cali duo would be in the DA vs ECNL argument?
I listened for years about the ECNL vs Non and now we need a new couple lol?
 
Anomaly said:
The right choice is whichever path will make our DD's happy, as it always has been, and as it always should be.
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Yep. We are struggling with a decision between DA and staying with my DD's current team, whose coach is great and who is really teaching the same style of play as DA anyway. Or rather, I should say that I am struggling. My DD has made her decision to go to DA.

We've been going to both teams' practices, because I've want to stretch out the final decision for a week or 2 just to be sure. If anything, she seems to be more and more certain. She likes the DA coach, the girls, and the idea of all that practice. She's engaged and happy there. And as I've been advised, "follow your daughter."
 
CaliKlines said:
Interesting perspective-

https://norcalsoccerdad.com/2017/03/14/why-we-need-the-gda-for-our-elite-girls/
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It is a good read and an interesting perspective. I question how much has changed when it appears that in a lot of cases we have the same coaches teaching the same kids the same skills. Four days a week of training is great; I think most kids at a high level are already doing that, so that isn't anything new. The biggest question I have is how do we validate that DA is working? Number of girls called up to the USMNT? How are we going to assess "individual player development?" It is still a team game. And let's not forget that scores and standings will be kept; are we expecting highly competitive people by nature to suddenly not care about wins and losses? As much as this may be about soccer, it also appears to be a power grab. My $0.02.
 
MyDaughtersAKeeper said:
And let's not forget that scores and standings will be kept; are we expecting highly competitive people by nature to suddenly not care about wins and losses?
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I have heard that standings will not be kept for the u14 age group. This at least supports the notion that USSF is trying to move the focus away from wins & losses for the youngest DA age group.

I suspect a parent somewhere will have a self-reported standings website set up before the season starts!
 
devupa2.0 said:
I have heard that standings will not be kept for the u14 age group. This at least supports the notion that USSF is trying to move the focus away from wins & losses for the youngest DA age group.

I suspect a parent somewhere will have a self-reported standings website set up before the season starts!
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All the scores are posted every week, no standing are made available publicly (except the combined are groups) but they are keep internally for showcase matches. The is a attempt to match teams with like records for all the showcases.

Publicly posted standing or not have little to no effect. Most DA teams and clubs play to win and everything else is secondary

The FIFA like rules in DA are different vs the college rules so while its nice to think or play like the pros some of that gets undone once you get to college, this is one area I wish they could work on.

DA is a program just like many others for the right players it can be great. I can tell you that each year the competition gets better and there are fewer opportunities for new players. Best chance for most players is the first year of a team. There are opportunity decisions to be made by the players to which program or system fits them the best. You can't really go half in, takes a lot of commitment, dedication, hard work over a long period, not every one can take that, really not that many weeks off like some might be use to over the 10+ month season.

If your players aim is to go for a college scholarship will DA work for that? yes but will that be any better vs ECNL, not likely for a while but maybe eventually.

Will the YNT or MNT improve because players are better trained to play technically more proficient? Perhaps but that's going to take several years also and maybe some more world cups. So in the meantime how will you know if DA might be a good fit? Curriculum, Coaching, training, style of play, organizational support, etc.... if the player is comfortable, happy and engaged then you will know by trying things out. Season does'nt start until Sept so plenty of time to explore options.
 
younothat said:
All the scores are posted every week, no standing are made available publicly (except the combined are groups) but they are keep internally for showcase matches. The is a attempt to match teams with like records for all the showcases.

Publicly posted standing or not have little to no effect. Most DA teams and clubs play to win and everything else is secondary

The FIFA like rules in DA are different vs the college rules so while its nice to think or play like the pros some of that gets undone once you get to college, this is one area I wish they could work on.

DA is a program just like many others for the right players it can be great. I can tell you that each year the competition gets better and there are fewer opportunities for new players. Best chance for most players is the first year of a team. There are opportunity decisions to be made by the players to which program or system fits them the best. You can't really go half in, takes a lot of commitment, dedication, hard work over a long period, not every one can take that, really not that many weeks off like some might be use to over the 10+ month season.

If your players aim is to go for a college scholarship will DA work for that? yes but will that be any better vs ECNL, not likely for a while but maybe eventually.

Will the YNT or MNT improve because players are better trained to play technically more proficient? Perhaps but that's going to take several years also and maybe some more world cups. So in the meantime how will you know if DA might be a good fit? Curriculum, Coaching, training, style of play, organizational support, etc.... if the player is comfortable, happy and engaged then you will know by trying things out. Season does'nt start until Sept so plenty of time to explore options.
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FIFA-like substitution rules interfere with development. They only exist in FIFA as traditional holdover from the days when pro teams had no substitutes, which saved money for the owners.
 
ECNL will continue to be a good platform for the girls. Girls DA should be eventually but IMO going to take more time than most think. Come back and 3-4 years and we will see.

High school, the other leagues or divisions across the country will still a viable platform for players so the right choice is the best fit each season for a player, Players and teams changes, new leagues or divisions pop up, coaches come and go, etc so I always advise to take things year at a time.

DPL is like fools gold but not cheap, just a imitation of the real thing. Fools some of people some of the time but in the end its a fools folly.
 
I like the DA potential but not for my daughter since she wants HS and a bit of fun. I think this is the separation between the elite players (who are willing to put in 4 practices a week) and the good players (who want 2-3). I also understand and agree that they are only allowed to play other academy teams in league. I do, however, object to academy teams ONLY allowed to play this way in tournaments and showcases. Why not let the Academy, ECNL and great non-academy teams play each other at Surf and other big tournys? It should be up to the tournament to only put the best of the best in flight 1 so shouldn't matter if you're academy or ecnl or just plain good. I'm sure Academy's defense will be that they don't want to waste time playing nobodies but come on! Prove yourself to the soccer world by beating out the ECNL teams. I already know the answer to this and it's because they won't be able to for a few years until Academy really does suck in the best of the best players. There will be several ECNL teams that are better than academy teams and why not prove it in a tournament. I myself would like to play some academy teams just to gauge the level of our team but looks like that is a pipe dream. Thanks US Soccer:(
 
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