I'm sorry but that is simply not true. The pay for play club soccer we have in this country may drag a few of the talented players out of high school but many/most kids with real talent and/or potential never get into our current flawed club system that often rewards money and/or other means more than it does talent. Colleges and high schools are win oriented and what wins is greater athletic ability not greater skills. This is particularly true at levels below the very top. attend a series of mid to lower level college practices and you will see little that really develops skills. Heck just two years ago I watched two colleges in preseason and early season practices and I saw development no better than we had in the 70s. Players were standing around in lines waiting for their turn to try a skill once ever minute or so. That is not how players learn to get better and it means that any that could get a lot better with proper training would never progress and never have the slightest chance at higher levels. If we are going to continue to use our educational system to develop players we cannot allow players that might want to and be able to play at higher levels to be neglected like they are and we cannot continue to ignore those that are not at the top at a young age or have the money to buy proper training. Club soccer, as it currently exists in the US, is only slightly better than the rest of the system in the US. I have seen a LOT of lip service payed to "soccer for all" but very very little actual meaningful steps toward opening up the development programs and making what we have better.
Yeah it's really tough to gauge the true efficiency of the ECNL because there haven't been many other youth leagues to compare it to. And while there are many bright spots within ECNL/DA/NCAA, the overwhelming majority having shortsighted (yet understandable) goals. FanOfFutbol is right in pointing out the main incentive for teams is still winning, not developing. I think this would be best shown by asking players in the ECNL/DA systems what their goal is and I'd wager most would say "to get a scholarship" not "become a professional". Yet how many young basketball players (on the men's side) are delusional in thinking they can go professional? It's the difference between business and desire. Players heading into the World Cup are coming from Lyon, Barcelona, Turbine Potsdam, Manchester City. Those players have a clear path to the professional game, while a handful of senior graduates simply make rosters in the NWSL. There are some really wonderful institutions in the college set up but they train four months out of the year. The world is training twice as much as our players, if not more, because there's a bigger incentive for them.
if your talking about woso, only a very few make good money as a pro. You mentioned Turbine Potsdam, their best player, Tabea Kemme, only made 35K Euros for the whole 9 month season. She supplemented herself by becoming a full fledged police officer. Finally Arsenal gave her a bigger contract for this next year. The French admit that there's only 3 full time pro teams in their whole 1st division. It's really no better in the NWSL, where most players are cooped up/live in dorm style quarters(do to their low salaries/base pay is only around $8K). Only the best American players are supplemented instead by the USWNT(to a tune of $250K).......if they got chosen/or get endorsement deals. hence, playing soccer while getting a college degree is rewarding, soccer is now the #1 female participation team sport in college I've often read that ECNL doesn't permit their players to play high school ball, but I've followed this youtuber who documents his girl playing for a powerful ECNL squad named De Anza Force 98, who got into the ECNL championships, went on to Barcelona to win an prestigous tourney(proving that select is just as good as anything by their top echelon pro clubs), and yet did play high school soccer as well)I don't see why not, most kids would love to play for their school) https://www.youtube.com/user/ht200 if we follow what other successful programs do, Japan is a powerhouse as well in u20. Apparently high school soccer is HUGE over there! https://the18.com/soccer-videos/japanese-high-school-soccer-massive
I realize that I have been stating an incomplete picture of what I feel is the problem with school soccer. It is not the fact of school soccer but rather it is the poor quality of both play and training in school soccer. Most high school and many college soccer coaches are simply unqualified to coach soccer. I am not talking about the top programs but rather about the majority of second tier Division I and many Division II and III college and about three out of four high school programs. As I have stated earlier the effectively unlimited substitutions and the stupid time keeping and the "there must be a winner" mentality in college often makes soccer into a totally different game. College and high school should play under age appropriate FIFA laws. If we will not or cannot get the kids into good programs outside of schools the we need to fix the broken school soccer system. I recognize that kids "want" to play for their schools and that is not a bad thing but when that playing situations hurt development that the kids also want and deserve then we need to fix the problems in the school system. There is also the realism in this that it is very unlikely to get fixed. After all the school systems are run by school boards and we have: "God made an idiot for practice, then he made a school board" Samuel Langhorne Clemens. In this country we have, correctly I think, separation of church and state. I think we also need "separation of school and sport."
What is available mostly depends on the state you're in I think. In Massachusetts there are both club teams and town teams available with a high degree of participation in the town youth teams. Club teams are very expensive, full of attendance rules and have excessive travel required. They are also very, very cut throat and you have no promise of even seeing the field and can be dropped from the travel team if somebody better comes along. I have several horror club stories Ive heard and never let my girls get involved in them (even though one tried out and qualified). I also was involved with town soccer for many years and found that club only drew a few players away from the town programs at each age level. Most kids want to play high school soccer and play with their friends and if playing club meant they couldnt play HS soccer, they dropped the club. I think the culture in Europe is different. Playing for a club is often the only chance a kid has at success so they do that. If theyre picked by age 12 or washed out. How many actually make the pro team? I don't know that but Im imagining its not many. Most kids here maybe hope to play in college but have no serious desire to make a career of it. So I don't see that type of system ever taking off here. My final point will be that our biggest problem is player identification. I don't believe we are identifying the best and brightest for our NAT teams. We are however picking from the club programs and the Div 1 college teams though. Who says they're the best? I think USSOCCER should study what Anson Dorrance did in 1986 (I think) He went on a search for new talent and found a bunch of players that were not in the US Pipeline. We know how that worked out. We need to expand our search as he did and find more diamonds in the rough. Thats my suggestion
Are you sure that the other YNT play more together than the american teams? I mean they were together for two years pretty much, many international events and camps nearly every month. I don't know for sure, but I would be pretty surprised if many of the other countries are together more. I know Clairefontaine added girls a few years ago, but not sure what exactly the other federations do to ready their girls' teams for WC competition.
Yes that is the problem and that the development of the "lesser" players pretty much is nonexistent so they really never get the chance to improve. It sounds like Massachusetts has a program that serves pretty well BUT that is not the norm for much of the country except for the excessively expensive club programs. As an example I will use Tennessee. (and most of the surrounding states) The schools and clubs only cooperate in that clubs are forbidden from playing during the HS seasons for the the players involved and most HS coaches, except the most enlightened, actively forbid their players from any contact with the club coaches during the season. Unfortunately that pattern is quite widespread throughout the US where the coaches and programs feel the need to protect their turf disregarding the best interests of the kids. Again I think we need to either fix the school's programs or we need to totally separate sports form school.
Some say that Klimkova had a personal relationship with Heinrichs when she was promoted. The group of girls youth national team coaches is very inbred
I have watched a lot of college soccer over the years and there is no doubt in my mind that the kids entering college these days are more skilled, overall, than the kids who were entering college in the past. I'm also not sure I completely buy this notion that talented kids are left out of the system. If you are really talented and on a high-school team, I would think that word about your talent would make its way to the nearest ECNL or club coach. I would think that the parents or high-school coach or other players would mention you to the nearest club coach. Word about talented kids in any sport tends to get around. I have no experience with club soccer, and so don't know whether they offer financial aid, or discounts, to those who can't afford the regular club fees. I read on their websites that they do, but to what degree that is actually true you may know better than I. I suppose it depends on the club. If I were a club manager or director and there was a really talented kid in the area region whose family couldn't afford the fees, I certainly would make every effort to get her on my team, and I have to think lots of club coaches would do the same--they want to win. I'm not really buying this idea that super-talented kids are somehow being overlooked. In any case, I'm not saying our system isn't flawed to one degree or another--there are a lot of youth players in America who don't have great ball skills--but I also don't think it's as bad as critics always claim every time a U.S. NT team at any level loses a match.
Some clubs offer aid to players and some do not and it varies not just by club but by region and even city, The super talented player is not the ones that I am that concerned about missing but rather the somewhat talented that are never given the chance to develop to their potential. Also you are wrong about HS coaches contacting club coaches. 95% of HS coaches want their players to NEVER see club play at all. Their turf is more important than the player's best interest. Of course the same can be said for most club coaches. When I coached club I was approached by a local HS coach that cared about his players (girls in this case) more than he did about protecting his turf. He invited me to help at his practices and, as the school season was active, there was no club play at the age group involved. We had several good practices then his school district told him to stop my involvement and my club said that if I continued to help the would fire me. I quit the club and he refused (his contract gave him full discretion at practice) to stop the relationship. BTW: The girls voted 24-1 to continue and all but two that played for me at the club moved with me to my new club. I moved to a smaller, but more progressive, club and he went on to coach for many years. But the ingrained bureaucracy tried their best to break up our coaching cooperation even though it really seemed best for the girls and best for the club and HS teams. Of course I am sure that there are many many stories of club/HS conflicts that did not work out as well for the kids and coaches involved. At this point I am very unsure how to fix the problems as they have been ongoing for a LOT of years. It has only been recently that it matters as before what we had was enough.
This is not the case in Oregon or Washington. Club soccer takes a break during the high school season, for girls in that age group. Virtually all of the girls who play high school soccer, and there are a lot, are club players during the balance of the year. There are some girls who go out for high school soccer who aren't club players, but not very many. I'll hazard a guess that about 99% of the starters on high school teams are club players. Of course, Oregon and Washington have huge rec/club programs.
My kids' club offers full scholarships and travel money to some players. I actually know some details about it because I helped to recruit a player for whom I knew financial aid would be required for participation. The kid is an impact player and receives basically free tuition/fees and travel allowance. We have facilitated the player's travel by offering for the player to share a room with our child at no expense, paid for some of her food at events etc. I know another ynt player in the club with a similar deal in another age group. the USSF through the DA offers financial assistance as well http://www.ussoccerda.com/scholarship-program I agree that the best players are not generally excluded from top level competition because of socioeconomic status. However, I do not believe that the clubs would have offered similar assistance to a player they believed would not make an immediate impact.
I believe you're correct as to Development Academy teams, but not as to ECNL teams. I believe that foregoing high school soccer in order to participate on a DA team is one of the major considerations for girls in deciding whether they want to try out for a DA team.
Agree that HS soccer is a major consideration for some kids. I do not believe it is a major consideration for some of the very best club players. I think some of the kids playing HS soccer and ECNL instead of DA in the older age groups are simply loyal to their club and coach. Why make the change when its only for a few years more and they are already committed or well along in the process?
As u say it's a rumor so Im not basing an argument on it tho I have read the same thing. My thought on this is Gustavsson should coach the 20s. He is already on the books and this would form a bridge between what the senior team is doing tactics wise and what they r teaching the next level of talent. It also gives USSoccer a chance to actually see their #1 assistant in a head coaching role to groom him for the big chair. Instead he scouts in Europe for them.
A college degree does nothing for a players' soccer development. It's a business decision for 99.9% of student-athletes to go to college, not because they are trying to be the best soccer player. The young players in France (and elsewhere) that are playing for either a full-time team or one where they only get room and board are there to play soccer-first. If they aren't, they leave. American players don't enter a soccer-first environment until they can crack the NWSL, which is at 22/23. Obtaining a scholarship/degree makes a lot of sense for student-athletes trying to further their work career, but soccer-wise there are a lot of barriers that inhibit their development.
to be sure the US YNT would like to keep a regular roster, but unless it's a mandatory FIFA tourney date, but otherwise you would think that the coaching staff have to respect the student athlete in terms of not taking them away from their studies/homework. So all they got is of course, the summer, winter break(4 weeks) & spring break(2 weeks). That's not to say that they still could fly the entire squad to their training grounds for the weekend(which I think is still the Olympic training center in Colorado Springs), but since these players are sacrificing a lot all ready(like missing the ritualistic Spring break), it's highly unlikely. I read something that at first Ashlyn Sanchez was going to miss the Concacaf tourney due to complaining about having too much homework, than had a change of mind & flew over there the day before the competition started you were asking about her much other NT's play together; here's the Euro u19 qualifier schedule to make the 8 team tourney for next year(they have this tourney every year). So they are way more busier & their more likely to be centrally located, for instance the German squad has 5 members of their Freiburg club https://us.women.soccerway.com/inte...p-women/20182019/1st-qualifying-round/r49708/ are you Jurgen Klinsmann? Cuz that's exactly what he exactly stated when he first took over the US NT, lol. The one big difference(and especially in Europe) is what men pro players get compared to women, which can be ridiculous 1% to 100%. pay scale. Here was a chart from Germany 3 years ago showing how the typical starter on the womens NT makes compared to their men's(and over there your not compensated much for playing for your NT). what i'm trying to show is that over here, our play soccer in college while getting a degree is a pretty good idea for women as a typical entry level teaching jobs pays just as well as the top echelon of German woso players & remember the pay scale for NWSL is a lot less than the woso Bundesliga
--A young U.S. woman would be dumb to turn down a scholarship offer at a good college to instead concentrate on soccer, because the pay in professional women's soccer does not justify going the pro route at an early age and because a good education is invaluable: It will benefit one throughout one's life. You will get better jobs and you will be a more well-rounded and well-informed person. --U.S. players are developed, and it is silly to say that they are not. Everyone overreacts to U.S. losses. We lost to Japan because one of their players took a flyer from 40 yards and the ball went in the net. They are good defensively but not much offensively and I predict they will not win the tournament. We tied Spain. Maybe Spain is a better U20 possession team than we are, but possession soccer is ingrained in that country as it is in Japan, where they have to play that way because they don't have the size and athleticism to play otherwise. It would be interesting to see where the Spanish players play--I'll bet most are from the same 2 or 3 pro club DA's., so they know each other well, and, as a few pointed out, they play more high-level games than our U20s do. I read that Spain's U20 side has three players who are on the Spanish senior side. Whether they start or play much or at all, I don't know--but they are on the senior team. We had no players who are on the senior NT. I'm not trying to suggest that our play was great (it wasn't) or that there isn't room for improvement at the youth level (of course there is), but everyone always wants to burn the house down when we lose a match. --High school soccer isn't relevant to this discussion. Any player with soccer promise who lives in a major and/or coastal state is playing club soccer--ECNL or otherwise. There are a LOT of good ECNL programs in this country, who are turning out a lot of good soccer players. I'd venture that three quarters of the players signed to scholarships by major Div. 1 college programs are from upper-tier ECNL clubs, all of which want to win. You don't win high-level ECNL games or tournaments merely by being athletic. Of course raw athleticism is a big advantage at young ages, but tends to be less so as you move up in age--teams have to play soccer to win. But what makes soccer fun is that it rewards both technical skill, tactics AND athleticism. And U.S. college programs--all the big ones, and there are many, certainly push development, even if one subscribes to the idea, and I'm not sure I do, that more substitutions leads to more direct/athletic play and less "soccer." --The USSF just started a women's development academy specifically to push the development of our young female players--no doubt partly to emulate, to the degree possible, the DA system in Europe. Is it worth emulating? I'm not convinced it is: Their system consists of pro clubs giving places to a /large/ number of somewhat talented kids aged, what, 11-14, who dream of playing pro soccer (because soccer is THE sport in Europe and South America, of course)--I'm talking more boys than girls here, but I suspect the same is happening with girls, or will soon--at the expense of everything else in their lives. I believe these big club DA's offer schooling, but how rigorous it is, I don't know--and I think the kids are basically immersed in soccer until they gradually weeded out of the system after 1, 2, 3, 4 or more years because they aren't good enough--and most end up being not good enough. And, so, at age 16-19, they are left dazed and confused and wondering what they will do with their lives after living soccer for many years. Some will play in second-tier pro leagues or for smaller clubs, if they play pro soccer at all. It will be interesting to see how the USSF girls DA system evolves. All this said, I do agree that the U.S. will have to work harder and better if we want to continue to be a power at the senior NT level and win titles at the youth level, because the world loves soccer and there will be more parity, among more nations, in the women's game going forward.
I don't really disagree with any that you say, just wanted to give an FYI here. 12 clubs are represented in the Spain U20 team. The most represented club is FC Barcelona with 4 players. But most of the women's program in Spain pattern themselves after the men's side. That is where you see the dedication to technique and possession based football.
We r way too result conscious in this country. Personally I don't try and judge the teams on results whether it's the senior team winning almost all the time or the youth teams failing at major events. I also don't buy into the development is working because hey look at Pugh and Davidson. I file that under the blind squirrel occasionally finding a nut theorem. Instead, I ask myself r they playing good soccer? While I agree that Japan got a lucky win I thought they outplayed the US. I thought Spain did as well. Had the US beaten either team and gotten through it wouldn't have meant they were playing better. I also didn't think the 2016 entry played very well and they finished 4th. As they play very hard and have talented players at each position, this comes down to coaching. If a better coach can have the team playing better soccer then why isn't USSoccer hiring better coaches. They r the elite international woman's program and certainly have the money. Don't the 20s deserve the best coaching available?
It's convenient to blame High School for the current stagnation in the United States in regards to soccer. However, that's a straw argument. Any player worth their salt is getting club training, high school is just a few months of the year; a much needed break from "club soccer" and all of its trappings. High school soccer has not hurt the US Women's team for the past few decades (I know, it hasn't helped either) But soccer isn't nearly as popular in the States as it is globally, that's why grassroots soccer in the communities (like high school) is important, we need to involve more players-fans.
Coming from Texas I always heard it as, "Sometimes even a blind hog finds an acorn." The meaning is rather obvious sometimes also refereed to as "serendipity" or also filed under the "Infinite number of monkeys and infinite number of typewriters given enough time producing the works of Shakespeare" saying. In any form it does seem to fit a lot of the coaching models I have seen over the years.