That is quite true. It is a cultural thing, too, as in American sports in general we are conditioned to think that the best teams are inherently producing the best players. Even without pay to play---which is not going away anytime soon---most American parents would still want to see their kids on winning teams.
I think it's changing rapidly as MLS spreads their tentacles to markets not in their footprint and more and more former college and especially pro players start coaching youth teams. The difference in skill goes up every year and is light years ahead of 20 and even 10 years ago. Just looking at how many U17-U20's are progressing up through really good Euro teams should show everyone the wave that's finally coming.
In all fairness, this focus on winning tends to take place in other american team sports - not just soccer. I think that this is an American youth sports problem, not a pay for play problem (although I would love to get rid of the pay for play model). The focus on winning just stands out more in soccer than in other American team sports because soccer requires years of learning how to solve problems quickly and ruthlessly. For the most part, if you are athletic, you can skip a lot of that learning at a younger age in other American team sports. There are so many breaks in the action that the coach can tell players what to do during stops or rests in the action. In addition, most people in most countries learn a lot of the subtleties of the game from their parents or other kids they know. In America, this often doesn't happen. When you combine that with a focus on winning in youth soccer, a lot of kids play the game for years, but never learn the very minimal basics of how the game is played. I coach 16 year old kids who have been playing travel soccer for years, but don't even know the minimal basics of the game. It would surprise people what I have to teach kids at that age. Having said all that, I think we all can agree that it would be wonderful if we could figure out a way to better fund youth soccer. When you have a pay for play model, there is always going to be a ton of dysfunction in the system.
The Dutch amateur system of an all ages club would be nice. There are seperate "clubs" for either youth/kids and for grown ups in the USA as far as I understand it. This doesnot seem efficient and cost effective to me. The late Arch Bishop of NY John Cardinal O’Connor, once complained about sports taking kids away from church on sundays. Instead of complaining (I suppose more religious leaders feel that way) churches could start an amateur competition on saturdays that is attractive (low cost) to parents. We Dutch have such a seperate competition called the saturday amateurs.
Plenty of religious organizations in the U.S. offer recreational sports, as well as competitive sports through religious schools.
It's always nice to hear how others get it done. I am afraid that pay for play will be around in the United States for a while, but it it truly is helpful to understand how other countries have figured it out. To be honest, I still am not sure how we are going to do it, but I hope that a way will evolve that the people in our soccer culture will buy into. I view pay for play a little like relegation/promotion in the pros - it isn't feasible right now, but things change and it probably will be very feasible at some point in the future. The key is to keep studying possible solutions so that, when the opportunity arises, we will be ready with the easiest, most natural system.
Solutions sought nation wide will be a fata morgana. The way to do it is start in a confined setting. I just learned about a conflict of a state about only registering youth players with the USSF. If that state would take a look at our amateur set up and copy it as a start to make it grow naturally, then it will have a chance to expand. But what I readso many times is the big solution, but that's impossible. Start small and let it organically grow. Start in that "brake with the mould state". It cannot be much smaller than us in the number of inhabitants, or Iceland.
MLS Academies are helping chance the landscape but it's just a portion of the vast youth soccer ocean. However, I do think win at all cost /never defeated/always believe mentality is something we don't want to lose in our professional players. It has shown up to be the X factor in a lot of big games. Not suggestion pay to play needs to stay but I want the best of both worlds. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
I don't think anyone is suggesting that American players lose the win-at-all-costs attitude. Rather, it is the coaches, especially at younger levels, that need to lose the focus on winning and redirect it toward development. Coaches should be capable of putting kids into positions where they have to figure out how to win a game while at the same time making sure that the kids play in a way that is going to help them become players who can master how to locate, create, and exploit space quickly, among other things.
I really donot think you will loose that, as it is something engrained in the USA psycho. That competitive edge could also be used to make kids compete on skills.
This came out of nowhere. My guess is that the FCD youth academy has gotten so large that more administrators than Luchi (who also coaches) were going to be required: From @Marcus_HS & @marcusfcdotcom to Frisco, how @GallJohn is going to take FCD Youth development to a new level➡️ https://t.co/tFYVcn1Q4P pic.twitter.com/mBDqZ5YDT0— Carter Baum (@CarterBaum) January 2, 2017
What does this league look like? Who pays for it (do the parents pay the full cost, or is it subsidized?) Also, what is done to keep the costs low? volunteer coaches and referees? In the US, we have AYSO and rec leagues which have relatively low costs but depend upon volunteers from the community. The big difference with the club teams (pay for play) is that they have professional coaches and no volunteer referees. In our area (I assume it to be true in much of the US), it is now possible for club coaches to make coaching at the club level their job/career. Except at the very elite level, those types of costs are not going to be absorbed for the player. Even at the elite level, I believe, most currently have significant costs. I would guess that over time and as MLS becomes more profitable some of the costs will reduce at the upper level but someone will still have t pay. The other alternative (rec leagues) is dependent upon the quality/knowledge of the volunteers which will improve over time but is highly variable and most likely, will remain so.
If you use the search function with "amateur", "kampong", "quick boys", "spartaan" posted by "feyenoordsoccerfan" in this thread, you get a load of info. When something isnot clear I am willing to try to answer that.
Interestingly enough, there is a club that I can think of that matches your description (in so far as originating from a group of people with similar interests/backgrounds). In Southern California there is a club called Fram which began (as I understand it) primarily as a social club for Scandanavians. The club still functions as a social club but they now have a soccer club which is very much pay for play. My guess is that Fram is not unique.
Jonathan Tannenwald at Philly.com has written a three part series about youth development in the U.S. Part II was specifically about the Union's academy. I decided to post Part III not because it contains any important developments but I just thought it would be nice hear some optimistic opinions that remind me that the glass is not half empty. http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/...-does-it-have-to-be-impossible.html?mobi=true
These findings regarding Manchester United's youth program are interesting. I know that in the youth programs of many of the bigger clubs in Italy in the 2003-2006 time frame, physically late bloomers were rare. I assume the clubs are getting better at identifying late bloomers with major upside potential, but if Manchester United's consultant is correct, perhaps things haven't changed much. The bio-binding idea has one major weakness: it would allow an older player, who likely is more developed mentally and tactically, to compete against younger players. I'm not sure that is helpful to the older player who is a late bloomer, even though it could be very helpful to the younger early bloomer.
Looks like no training compensation and solidarity payments here, at least for the foreseeable future: Check out @SoccerInsider's Tweet: MLS players' union responds to court victory pic.twitter.com/pOSa54ML3j— Steven Goff (@SoccerInsider) March 30, 2017
Check out @thegoalkeeper's Tweet: What the MLSPU doesn’t say is that the case was dismissed for lack of jurisdiction. That might not constitute a ruling on the real question. pic.twitter.com/utwR8Av5PX— Jonathan Tannenwald (@thegoalkeeper) March 30, 2017
As much I think compensation could be good for soccer in America I think there's no way challenging the lack of compensation from a law stand point would work. Regardless of jurisdiction what could you challenge from a legality stand point? These kids are paying to play in academies, so a contract in which they lease training in exchange for currency. Once the service is exchanged and accepted these kids have no legal obligation to the academy. And at no point are these academies in a contract with MLS. I guess you theoretically could get kids to sign contracts with the academy for potential compensation, but contracts with minors almost always can be disaffirmed. Maybe I'm missing some kind of privity for a academy team to a kid signing a professional deal with an MLS team. There could be interference of a business relationship if this was between two pro teams with intentions to promote players to the pro ranks. Though, if MLS wants to grow they should compensate academies.