Jim, you'd be surprised at how small a world the soccer world is and who the people posting to some of these forums are. Posters aren't as anonymous as you might think and if more than one poster tells you a poster is who they say they are, you can assume that they are. There are too many out there who would be able to recognize a fraud.
you are a bit off there, bud. small, medium, big, don't matta, these clowns are every where. docs of these idiot clubs also emphasize winning over all else. i know a few coaches who are told by their docs that working on foot skills will not win them games and it's waste of time. "they must run, run hard, sprint, no bathroom break, sprint. every practice has to be intense. Intensity is the key, blah, blah, blah." talking about u9 - u11 girls who just came out of ayso. yeah, soccer is improving in US but there are still way way too many clowns coaching kids out there. and way too many idiot docs. too bad
Sorry can't comment any more. Wife and I are flying off to the Barcelona. Guardiola needs some tips on training young players. Plus Messi has been missing a step and needs me to yell at him. I also got to make Puyol run until he throws up.
Really? That's the best you can come up with? I guess when simple minds can't come up with any suitable response in an argument, they go after the person. Maybe when my daughter is done with the game, I can be a bitter, old man that blames the system for everything and fails to take any personal responsibility. Quit worrying about me, I'm quite well adjusted.
What the hell are you talking about? what kind of "personal responsibility" would you want me or the other reasonable minds in this thread to take? By the way I'm 29 this week. Hardly "old"
Sorry. Bitter young man. The personal responsibility that I am talking about is to watch out for your own. The club system will not change. It is given even more power by the monopoly that is the ECNL. The need for clubs to win is even greater. It's up to you to decide what is in your kid's best interest. If you don't like screaming coaches, then don't let your kid play for one. If you don't like your club's training program, find one you like. If you can't find one that fits, start your own and award them all participation medals. Complaining about the club system is like complaining about government. It is what it is and you need to make the best of it for your kid and yourself.
So everyone who dares to disagree with you is "bitter"? This "need for the clubs to win" is the whole problem as has been pointed out. This is the reason the USA isn't producing world class players on the mens side. I do believe the club system will indeed change and the changes will eventually come from the top. The USSF.
I have to disagree with this. The reason we don't produce top players on the mens side in this sport is actually very simple. Too many other, more popular options. I am involved on the girls side of the game at the moment but also have a son who is 10. He played soccer until he was 7 then he didn't want to play soccer anymore. He wanted to play football. And baseball. And now basketball. Most of his friends made the same decision. Our team can field 8 9-10 year old little league teams, 8 11-12 year old little league teams. We only have enough for i U10 and U12 boys soccer team. And the numbers are low. Kids watch football and baseball on tv, their parents watch these as well and with all these leagues playing basically year round (at least baseball does) there are too many other options for boys. On the girls side there are not as many options, so most of the good athletes still stick with soccer.
Interesting conversation. Texans are a crap organization, just like Sting, Lone Star, Challenge, Eclipse (and name any other major girls' club-I won't address the boys' side). They all over-emphasize winning at young ages. Bottom line is: if your daughter is not doing extra work on her own, she will suffer. If your daughter wants her best shot at playing major college soccer, and receiving athletic scholarship $$, she will play at one of those clubs. But....it's not for everyone. As for the USSF, they are about as competent as the post office. Our national team programs are terrible-they cannot compete on a world stage. The selection process for the youth national teams, and the people doing the selecting, is a large part of the reason we get grossly underskilled oafs like Carli Lloyd and Shannon Boxx playing on the USWNT, and that we are limited to playing "kick the ball to Abby's head" as our best strategy. And, by the way, I'm not too impressed with either coaching licenses (any monkey can get one-even an " A", and I'm happy to give you examples), writing an article for "The Pitch" (couldn't you get one in a better publication, like The Green Sheet or the Auto Trader?) or being a former USMNT player from years ago. That just means you got to run around the pitch getting your ass kicked by foreign teams while wearing booty shorts. If your argument is flawed, it's flawed, and no amount of chest thumping changes that.
Okay...let's summarize. 1. The club system has a mixed agenda (at best) that is not 100% focused on the development of the players. 2. The problem does not seem to be getting fixed...certainly not at the rate that some would like. ECNL id2 is a nice step above the very political ODP system...but it too falls short...at least to this point. 3. Clubs and their DOCs are mostly focused on whatever needs to happen to make their top teams more competitive because winning begats recruiting which begats more winning and more dollars for the clubs. 4. The above 3 issues are the main reasons why the USA is not producing more world class players and why our US women are getting caught by other nations and our US men are always in the second tier of teams worldwide...at best. Okay...I completely agree with the first three points and would even add some layers of disfunction to the list. We as parents have limited abilities to do much about it short of withholding our $$$ from such a system. But, the alternatives are few and we only have a few years with our DDs and BBs before they are out of the nest. So we do the best that we can...even with the shortcomings of the system. But...I have to take issue with item #4. Our women are and will continue to be one of the premier nations for women's soccer because soccer is in this country getting a very fair share of our very best athletes. Men's soccer does not nor will it ever get a fair share of the very best athletes in this country at the youth level...mostly because of American football and basketball get an unfair share of the best athletes. It is as simple as that. You can have the very best technical, tactical, and motivational soccer coaches in the world in this country and you will still not have a consistent top five showing by the US men until we get better athletes. The women do get some of the very best athletes and because of this we will stay at or near the top...even with the shortcomings in items 1 through 3 above. We should continue to address items 1-3 as best that we can...but I don't see 4 being changed on the men's front ever...or at least until we get more of our best athletes playing the game.
I have to slightly disagree with you. While many of the top clubs do overemphasize winning, some do not. My DD plays for one of the clubs you mentioned, and the club does a very nice job of not focusing on winning at her age (U13) and below. We have a pool of players across several locations that would probably dominate if the club let them. We have played a number of events where we have taken kids from all locations and combined them and the club has never put their best 15 girls on a team together. They intentionally mix the poorer players with the better so that girls don't get shorted of the opportunity to develop. We just had a team meeting where parents were complaining because we keep losing to the same kick ball team, and the coach was very quick to tell them they didn't know what they were talking about and to quit worrying about winning. Our entry in the ECNL at U14 does not even include all the best players at that age. Now, once they get to U15 I will admit they do focus a lot more on winning, but at some point the emphasis does have to shift a little.
You are describing the program at Eclipse and I agree with you as this is also my info and observation as an outsider to the club. I have to say, their U14s North Black team plays some outstanding soccer for that age ( I know that there is a large group of players for that age and the club mixes it up for player development reasons). I've seen many of their younger players and the coaches at Eclipse do a lot to develop them and teach them to play good soccer. The teams win, but the coaches do not sacrifice development or take shortcuts in order to win these games/tournaments/events.
That's what I keep hearing but it still doesn't mean they're right. It just gives them the ability to throw accusations and half truths out and the lemmings on this board will go along with them. I wish everyone would quit thinking that these people are always right because of their perceived "street cred" and actually read the posts.
http://www.socceramerica.com/article/43960/top-us-boys-clubs-get-report-cards.html Claudio Reyna, lemming.
This was in a different forum: "There are 5 Eclipse U-14 girls squads in MRL (the 13s from this earlier discussion) and through a couple of MRL weekends they have a combined 20-2-1 record. North Black has concluded MRL to focus, I assume, on ECNL, and they went 7-0 scoring 52 and giving up 4. Tri-Cities rolling, as well. Yowsa." The South and East locations are doing fine in MRL, as well. The club will have to have 2 or 3 top level teams to keep this many talented girls beyond this year. They are being taught good soccer and they have the athletes to do it effectively.
What is the purpose of you quoting this in relevance to my post? Are you agreeing or arguing something that I've pointed out?
Jeez, you hammertoe, I am agreeing with you. Didn't want to plagiarize this nugget, so I quoted directly. Felt it was fairly obvious I was supporting your statement.
I note with interest....but zero suprize...that Jims beloved Dallas Texans failed to acheive even 3 stars in this 5 star system.....in other words they received (at best) an "average" grade.....something I believe I mentioned several pages back...love these quotes from Claudio Reyna...."I was blown away by the behavior of coaches on the sideline....screaming and foul language...disrespecting refs"......and this..."perhaps the most valuable aspect of the evaluations is that it takes the focus off results"
I am not surprised but you obviously failed to look at the results of the study. The Texans received an overall grade of 3.5 stars. Look it up. Once again, don't let the facts get in the way of your rant against the club. Man, don't you feel stupid now?