Sweeping changes to US Soccer? What would you do?

Much of this crap would end with Pro/Rel. The sheeple parents would have options and the money would be flowing in the opposite direction.

 

And this is another dilemma. Spain had/has a great national team but all those guys play on RM or Barcelona. No wonder they are so good, they know each other's strengths and weaknesses so well. But the price Spain pays is that those two teams win the league 98% of the time. Sorry, but I am not interested in a domestic league organized like that just to make the USMNT into some powerhouse.

 

Umm, no. Over expansion is not even remotely a problem on the player development side. You're missing the big picture.

Calm Down? We just lost a must-draw match to an Caribbean Island with 1.2 million people.

There's an obvious solution that the powers running this sport do not like. It comes down to whether the U.S. Soccer fans have the stones and resolve to force it down their throat.

 

End "Pay-to-Play" and do it now.

It is a cancer in travel baseball, AAU basketball, and even in lacrosse and field hockey, where parents go into debt thinking their kid will make the national team by playing on A Certain Club and participating in A Certain Tournament to get exposed.

You're already seeing vacillation from players in the Development Academies, people who want to play with their friends at school rather than being playing for 11 months on an all-star team.

http://highschoolsports.nj.com/news...make-tough-calls-with-us-development-academy/

 

And use Ian Darke's voice when you say that. "Iceland .... ICELAND!!"

 

If we were a proper soccer/footballing nation Gulati and Arena would have already resigned.

I cringed when we brought Arena back and took a lot of crap on Twitter in June when we started nervously against T&T after that humiliating friendly draw with Venezuela. But this guy, who got to play with stacked decks in MLS for years and acted like he masterminded everything barely had to do any tactical managing and was obviously out of his depth.

It's sad that Clint Dempsey won't get another World Cup. I agree with some of the other previous comments its going to take another generation and more technical coaching throughout all levels for MLS to start attracting & producing the type of athletes that could become class soccer players.

 

But doesn't this work in reverse, too. If our St. Louis guys in 1950 can beat England, isn't just as likely that pro levels guys all from T&T can beat us?

 

They just did last night.

 

Thoughts?

 

It's worth thinking about why MLS seems to have helped our regional rivals more than it's helped us. And maybe it's US pro soccer more broadly, not just MLS. There are a fair number of NASL and USL pros on some concacaf teams.

I'm not sure why this discrepancy exists, but I think it does, and I think it's why qualification mishaps are more fatal recently. Mexico really should have been eliminated last time.

It's true that neither us now or them then were playing at close to each pool's potential, but the US and Mexico both seemed to survive such errors with more ease in the cycles post 94 and prior to 2014.

 

I saw the game too. My point is that you're not always going to get to be Rocky. Some days you're Apollo Creed.

 

I like Hislop's idea that you need to find a solution that will work for your particular situation. Not sure what that would be.Somehow finding a more cohesive strategy that takes advantage of the diversity in styles in US soccer?

Looking at the results all through this cycle I feel like other nations in the region have outperformed the US because they adopted a strategy on the field that worked for them. Costa Rica for a while now has largely had a defensive strategy that took advantage of Navas but also let them get everybody on the same page quickly. That seems necessary in qualifiers.

The US has really lacked that for a while now.

 

If you aren't going to be prime age or younger for qualifying in 2020-2021 era then you have no place on the national team, keepers of course being excepted but Howard needs to put them up as well.

 

pretty much spot on. the mountain of the problem is that US soccer is like the US federal government. TOO big to reform, too big to optimize for efficiency, too much politics, etc.. Dudes in charge won't reform something if it will take their salary away. I think we have to live with the way things are. Maybe once in a century, a US national team will rise like Excalibur to make a run for glory. Out side of that, youth soccer will be pay-to-play.

Hell, I live in the DC-MD-VA area. There's a ton of 'pitches' that are built. They are 'permit only' and you must pay to pay on them that is if you can get a permit. The big clubs, hog them up and so if some club wanted to do things the right way, they don't have a chance. The only people that use them for pick up games are minorities and they get chased off by school ADs or Park & Rec officers.

 

We forget that this team didn't always give effort. Blowing up USSF (which should be done BTW) does not cure that. That is pure team selection, which can doom even the best system, just look at the Dutch.

 

It would be useful to recruit better pure athletes at a younger age. We lose a lot of top athletic talent to baseball, basketball and football because that's where the prestige and the money are to be found.

 

We have to get the best out of our player pool. We have to get the best athletes, technically gifted and most intelligent players we have and make our team one of the best in the world. More kids need to be exposed to the sport and more need to be given opportunities to play with our youth teams.

323 Million means nothing if not many play soccer and if many of those who do are left out.

 

I posted this in another thread, but if you're a 9 year old kid and you can go score touchdowns, make base hits, or shoot baskets vs learn the Cruyff turn, which are you going to do? Youth soccer has to figure out how to teach youngsters skills without turning the sport into music practice.

 

The issues are more systemic than just the Soccer hierarchy. School is mandatory until you are 18 in the US. In Europe and S.America you can leave at 16 in most countries, sometimes under conditions but you are free to pursue soccer 100%. Players that have been identified at 12-14 now can play with the pro team full time. In the US, they are stifled until 18 then most choose college vs. a career in soccer. Until this changes, the best US talent will be filtered between full-time education and some into MLS and other leagues. Secondly, most US games are structured - "plays" are called...ala Basketball, Football etc...with coaching and pay to play is the method for youth soccer here, kids become structured, and don't develop the feel for the game that is gained from pick up or just playing with friends. The goal in US youth soccer isn't for a career, like in other countries, its to get into higher education for free. Pulisic played with older kids when he was young, then onto Germany at 16...how many other players have or will follow that path?
Changing management and coaching at the NT level isn't going to change a thing unless the systemic handbrake is released. JMHO

 

Those with European passports

 

I think lots of people don't realize how important this is. We look at participation numbers, which are high. I don't think that number really catches the number of kids that aspire to be a pro soccer star in the same way as in other US sports. So the potential pool isn't as large as it seems. I also think it's bigger than organized soccer. The time needed requires free as well as organized play.

Look at the pool now and its still heavily influenced by immigrant communities and their descendants and coaches kids. I have absolutely no issue with this. Guys who want to play and give their all for the national team are Americans. But that demo on the team is a symptom of the fact that soccer is still a niche sport.

I think this is changing. Look at the kids w/ soccer jerseys you didn't see prior to this decade. But it's going to change more slowly than anyone wants. This is true of other US deficiencies: scouting and coaching. They're improving, but more slowly than we'd want.

In the mean time I think we need to admit we are still a relative newcomer to international soccer and adopt a strategy that recognizes the particular strengths and weaknesses the team has.

For the current team we should emulate Costa Rica more so than Germany.