Bob Bradley mentions Claudio specifically. And he's not the only one who mentions the need to focus on development over winning--which is what Reyna has been saying. Hackworth and Porter both stress this very point.
While each contributors have great observations, did anyone notice that Ernie Stewart (the one with the least amount of coaching experience of the seven) hit the nail on the head pointing out the irreplaceable factor: quantity of quality training. Whether it's Bradley, Schmid, Porter or Roengen, they all get the cream of the crop to work with, and we can't expect them to go around and urge the clubs to change their routine. Again, without implementation, any great plan worth nothing. Nothing will change until a major do-over happens at the helm of USSF, and a policy that nobody can dodge will implement the radical changes we need.
Stewart may have the least amount of coaching experience but he probably has the most European based experience of how things are done correctly and proven to work. Therefore I'm not surprised that he hit the nail on the head with what he said about quantity of quality training. Should be specifically noted that he said "training" and not necessarily "matches". A lot of people in US are obsessed with playing a lot of matches and tournaments, leaving very little time for quality practices. Practices are where young players learn the most and shape themselves as better players by learning various things. Matches are for experience and to apply what they learn at practice, though there is some learning part there as well. But learning and developing largely takes place at practice, with lots of work and good coaching, methodically.
Only a year after the "development curriculum" comes the "Developmental Model" What is the difference between the two? What does the "model" do that the "Curriculum" does not do? Is this a case of trial and error? It is a shame, because i believe this is why our kids are also so confused about a simple game like soccer.
atosoccer10, When the Federation presented the Development Curriculum to the circus, US Youth Soccer found itself a few steps behind. So they had to come out with something, they call Developmental Model. Now, they jumped the bandwagon also, better yet trying to interpret it to the masses . . . Join us on another post: "Viva le Revolution" and read this proposal from US Club Soccer: http://www.usclubsoccer.org/Files/US Club Soccer - Youth Club Standards - 2012-02-09.pdf
What If you live in a city where the competitive leagues all play 7v7 for 6 and 7 year olds? I am not fond of that structure for little kids. the only 4v4 that I know of is AYSO and other leagues where a parent is volunteering. Nothing wrong with this but if you get the wrong parent as a coach it can be a waste of 9wks.
Interesting questions. There is a club out here that is looking to be a flag ship for this. Funny thing is that between last season and this season they fired a bunch of coaches and stopped taking on low/mid level teams. So in other words they only took the best kids because the current crop of trainers/coaches are not capable to developing players. Gonna be fun picking on the Director when I see him - if they do jump on this. All good fun - but there is a point there for sure Another issue to consider is the difficulty in developing players who come in from a rec environment at u12 - or come from a "play off the scoreboard" club at u12. Most of these kids have horrible habits and when your talking about half - or possibly an entire roster with bad (different) habits, it makes development far more difficult then at the lower age groups. I frankly do not think there are that many coaches who are capable of turning around these sorts of players/teams in even a half season - sure maybe 1 or 1.5 seasons but lets face it, when an entire team needs to go back to the basics of passing, trapping and dribbling- learning new positions etc... they are bound to get stuffed week after week by the competition. I see few parents who would put up with that and many more would would jump ship to another club. So retention at the upper levels for kids that jump into development at u12 is going to be difficult.
Sockers in Palatine has a great program for 6-7 year olds. Micro-Magic and Little Legends are two other solid programs. FCB (Barrington) offers an array of advanced REC (basically development) programs for kids this age. All these programs run in winter and summer as well.
Development for soccer players certainly need overcome America's "Little League Baseball" mindset. On this topic of compensation to clubs here in US for putting out a spectacular player, with parents having already paid put aside, one can only trust that the likes of Donavan and the rest of America's "Dirty Dozen" gone over there to battle high level, will be both gracious and magnanimous to all their former youth clubs. With all those high caliber coaches these individuals had the fortune to train under, it's completely unimaginable for me to think otherwise.
I'm just starting to learn about how all this really works, but is it possible at all for the USSF to sign contracts w/ kids (parents permission) that join the region/state(?) teams that would stipulate the player would have be trained, housed, etc paid in full in return for a % of a future income in his/her first pro contract or even have USSF make direct sales. The league that originally trained the player could also be paid a finder's fee. That could potentially solve many issues that is wrong with the system as it is by incentivizing real player development for all the youth leagues, generate money and would essentially create a scouting system without having to hire.
There are a lot of problems. 1) FIFA prohibits international transfers prior to age 18. 2) There are child labor laws at various levels. Generally in the US you need to be age 14 to be a professional athlete. During the school year you cannot work more than 15 hours per week at that age. So as a result, an amatuer athlete may practice and play longer than a professional may. 3) Professional coaches at the major European clubs with youth academies generally cannot tell even at age 16 which players are actually going to turn out to be successful at the senior level. Very few succeed. 4) There are no professional women players that would earn salaries that could fund development. 5) The development system is different for boys and girls. ODP for example is more important for girls. Boys have the USDA system. 6) A contract such as you suggest would probably not be enforceable, anywhere, in any fashion. 7) The cash flow generated or rather lack of any would be equivilent to having no cash flow for all practical purposes. 8) There are about 20 million children playing soccer in the US. There are about 500 "jobs" as professional soccer players in the US, counting some at the poverty level. Even 10% of the total salary for all MLS players developed in the US is a rather small sum compared to funding a national program. 9) From what I have seen the big name players from the US, and some naturalized US citizen-players, have voluntarily contributed their time and money to support youth development in this country. 10) ODP and national teams don't start until U14. The real deficiency in development is at the fundamental level working with pre-teens. For practical reasons coaching should be focused on the individual and basic skills. Excluding individuals based on skill level at that stage of development is counterproductive in the long run. I probably should not have said "skill level" in that last sentence since most exclusions are based on physical abilities rather than technical skill.
Girls have ECNL and id2 now, both of which seem to be gaining ground. I'm not so sure that deficiency in development is greater at the fundamental level (U8-U12) compared to at the older levels. In my area I've seen more U10 teams playing good soccer, than U14s and older playing good soccer. In general, I'm more disappointed with what I see at the older age groups than the younger ones, in terms of playing and training.
Travis Clark has some good observations here: http://www.topdrawersoccer.com/club-soccer-articles/state-of-the-game:-us-soccer-dev-part-1_aid24564 Look for the link to Part 2 towards the bottom of Part 1
Good article, thanks for sharing it. I read all 3 parts. The one thing I agree with the most (and have been saying for some time on this forum) is that "MLS clubs have to lead the way in player development". But for that to happen they need to change their player policy IMO. There will always be plenty of kids who will (choose) to go to college. And that's OK. But we need more youth players into MLS, local kids if you will. Younger kids need that local 18-year old hero who made it to MLS, someone that they can aspire to be, look up to and can relate to.
The author seemed uninformed (at best) to me, so I don't credit any of his observations or conclusions. For instance: 1) He draws his conclusions from watching matches, not training. He has no idea who has trained the players he is watching, 2) He draws his conclusions from team play rather than individual skills (his only comment on skills was he didn't notice any "super-flashy individuals"), 3) He ignores ODP, licensing, and state organization regulations when he states: "It’s only been five years – give or take – where our professional league and federation has taken any kind of organized, uniform action to try an develop players at the national level," and 4) he described play as "Coaches weren’t married to a certain formation either, as there was a lot of in game tactical switches and formation changes," which raises doubt in my mind that he understands what he is seeing. This sounds like a typical male non-playing parent's comment, along with the typical focus on youth soccer as a means of developing male professional players. The best explanation of what is needed to develop elite soccer players is still on BigSoccer. Read scoachd1's comments in this thread: https://www.bigsoccer.com/community/...al-to-us-success-than-people-imagine.1179944/
I don't understand your point. Are you saying that ECNL and id2 are equivilent to USDA for boys? Are you saying that ODP is not more important for girls than for boys? Or are you agreeing with my statement?
I just pointed out to you that girls have ECNL and id2 now, both of which are gaining ground on ODP. Yes, you can call the ECNL an equivalent to the USDA, but it's not exactly the same. The id2 program draws a lot of its players from the ECNL teams. And ODP is losing ground on the girls side too, at least in my area. It's still more popular for girls than it is for boys, but things are changing on the female side too. Another point I want to add is that IMO there is more competition of good players and teams at the highest level for boys than there is for girls.
You are off on a tangent from what I said. ODP is a USSF state-organization run program that feeds the national teams. It is not a club or league. There is no alternative girls USSF program like for boys so ODP is more important to girls than to boys. The boys have an alternative USSF run feeder program in the USDA. The USDA has clubs, but the clubs have to follow standards set by the USSF. This direct USSF involvement in the running of the USDA clubs is what distinguished USDA from from the multitude of "elite" leagues in "pay to play" soccer. The clubs are threatened with the boot if they don't obey USSF. USSF doesn't police the elite leagues. State orgainziations still have ODP for boys. What you are talking about, from what I gather on line, is more like US Club soccer or the many so called super leagues. Just another "elite" league in my book. It is not a replacement for ODP, so they don't directly feed the national team pools. Before we go there, I didn't say ODP (or USDA) involvement was "necessary" to make the national team pool. I said it was important.
Do you think you are telling me something new here? I knew all that. Let me try again, ECNL and id2 is an alternative for ODP for the girls side. Yes, it's run through US Club not USSF, but still....it's an alternative and it's gaining ground. Many of the top female players are part of the ECNL and id2, forgoing ODP. Perhaps some of them still start at it when they are 12-13 years old, but since ECNL starts at U14, many of the top players stop attending ODP. And yes, ECNL is run differently than the USDA, with the big difference being that US Club can't dictate to the clubs the same way USSF can to the USDA clubs. However, US Club has its own requirements for clubs to be part of the ECNL. FYI, US Club also created the NPL (MDL for my area) on the boys side. Many USDA clubs' U13-U15 pre-academy teams participate in it as preparation for the academy program.