Garber and Gulati want Kathy Carter. The question is why? Is it to line their pockets? Or is it because she is intelligent, well spoken and very experienced in business matters. I hope the latter.
1. Pro/rel, find out how soon we can put it in place. 2. Officially stablish the top 4 divisions, teams competing nationally to make it to mls, longer season. 3. Better high school and college soccer, longer seasons, more organized. That’s it.
Every time I see this thread I want to write, build a solid economy, improve our infrastructure, and strengthen our foreign policy. (I’m keeping it generic so we don’t devolve into a discussion of real issues like health care or tax policy.)
Listening to TalkSport today. They're having a segment on providing places for "grassroots soccer" (ya, they called it soccer). According to the discussion, the FA and clubs contribute money to the building of fields ... errrrrrr .... pitches for the public to play on. And, in the discussion, one guy said the Netherlands spends a billion (can't remember if it was Euro's or if the guy had converted it to pounds) per year to build and maintain soccer fields for public use. A *billion*. Imo, one of the best things the USSF could do to grow the sport is advocate for the construction of futsal courts. They should take the position that every time a new park is built with a basketball court, there should be a futsal court. Nothing fancy - concrete surface, same as the basketball court, metal pipe goals. The USSF should step up and pay for some of these to be built in municipal parks, as a proof of concept. And, they should require MLS teams to build or pay for the building of a certain number of futsal courts in their market area. Kids gotta have a place to play, in order to play. I know, people talk about driving past empty soccer fields where they live. But, 1) where I live, all the fields are rented out to AYSO. If you try to get a pickup game going the park police kick you off the field 2) when it rains, or the field is wet, no one is going to play. 3) you still have to bring goals with you. If there is a futsal court near you, all you have to do is show up with a ball.
For what it’s worth, there are a bunch of parks around here that have concrete futsal courts. I’m in norcal, and not sure if that is the norm elsewhere, but I use them frequently
That's great! I'm in SoCal and I've never seen a futsal court here. What do they do for goals on the courts up there?