Why US soccer is underachieving

Discussion in 'Soccer in the USA' started by persianfootball, Sep 18, 2016.

  1. persianfootball

    persianfootball Member+

    Aug 5, 2004
    outside your realm
    #1 persianfootball, Sep 18, 2016
    Last edited: Sep 18, 2016
    first of all, i want to note that this is a serious, constructive discussion aimed at examining the reasons for USAs current football standing and how to improve it; its not a troll thread or anything like that.

    on the asian forums we were having a discussion about population/soccer interest vs management (ie infrastructure, youth programs, management of federation, etc...) and their correlation to soccer success. one cannot ignore the USA when it comes to this discussion, so i decided to make this thread here as well.

    management has the highest correlation to soccer success than other factors. look at india and china, both have more die-hard football fans than any other team in the world, but they lack management. there is a weak correlation between football success and population/soccer interest. i will give another example, bahrain, population of 1 million, was the 5th best team in asia in the 2000s. thats also why japan and south korea, populations 130 million and 50 million, are at the same level when their other factors (management+interest in sport) are the same.

    all of the top countries in the world have high levels of management, and even relatively poorer footballing powerhouses such as the south american powerhouses still have good management (maybe not as much infrastructure, but still strong in other aspects such as youth programs) due to a long history of footballing culture.

    also, in countries with a decently sized population, it does not matter that much if football is the 1st or 4rth sport, as there will still be many millions of people who consider football their number 1 sport.

    you might say that USA is an anomaly to this rule, but if we look more carefully, it is still consistent with this rule. USA has a huge population, they definitely have enough football fanatics to succeed, and they have good infrastructure and access to friendlies and such. however, their overall management aspect is actually not that strong: this is because although they have infrastructure and money, their lack of football history and culture means they dont know how to use it efficiently. they teach kids "soccer" in a flawed manner from a young age: they dont have professional coaches. its no surprise that their best player, donovan, was influenced by mexican immigrants (a country with strong footballing culture). thats why even with all their infrastructure and connections and money, they have not been able to be at the level they should be at (but their infrastructure, money, and connections still did make USA improve a lot, which shows how important the overall "management" category is).

    i live in canada and i see how the office culture is: lots of meaningless, empty paperwork, resulting in no improvements, and unnecessary deficits. in general i have noticed that common sense and cleverness is missing. most employees are lazy and concerned with pay raises and TGIF, and taking expensive "business meetings" which dont achieve much. there are millions of dollars in unnecessary expenditures like this. so i am assuming USA is the same. whereas in some other countries, there are a lot of clever people with common sense who would succeed if they had the chance, but there is blatant corruption which puts unqualified people in management positions, at the expense of these hard workers. but in canada/USA there is too much meaningless lazy bureaucracy. much of the actual work is done by immigrants. so i am assuming that many football officials in the USA are also like this. had they put some saavy people in the position, and hired european coaches nation-wide to teach kids from a young age, and limited all the meaningless bureaucracy and expenditures, USA would be a top 5 team within 5-10 years.

    as for why canada is underachieving: mostly the same reason, that is, no footballing culture/history: kids get into the sport without proper guidance, but also because canada does not care about sports much, there is little gym time in schools, and most soccer-loving immigrants in canada have parents who are skilled professionals who come to canada so their children would study and get a good job, not to do sports. i remember toronto FC had tryouts to pick 1 player for the team, and they ended up choosing an athlete who had no technical ability. that is the problem: when you choose athletes over soccer players, you will not advance. do iniesta, xavi, and messi look like amazing athletes? this is also why its absolutely ridiculous to say something like "if athletes like lebron james grew up playing soccer they would be amazing at it." this ties back to the importance of soccer knowledge/culture. i found this problem at all levels in canada: from school sports teams to professional "rep" leagues. the coaches were absolutely clueless. soccer starts young. you will hardly get a player like messi who starts learning football at 15/16. it as to be under 10. the player has to have an intrinsic "feel" for the game at a very young age. unfortunately, this is missing in USA/canada, and must change by reforming the youth system. in the absence of footballing culture/history, it must be created by foreign coaches who influence players at the youngest age possible. there is no other way. USA has enough money to get top clubs to open academies inside the USA. i am surprised i did not hear of many of these... even though i am sure some exist. much more need to exist. with their money and connections and influence, US could easily get teams like barcelona to open academies for 4-5 year old boys in multiple cities in the US. why this was not done right from the 1994 world cup is baffling, but strengthens my argument: US soccer officials are incompetent.

    i remember carlos quieroz wrote a "Q-Report" plan in 1998 which aimed to make USA a footballing powerhouse by 2010. it had a budget of 50 million dollars. according to wikipedia it did result in 2 actual adaptations: Generation Adidas (previously called Project-40 when sponsored by Nike) and U.S. Soccer's U-17 residency camp in Bradenton, Florida. however, i just think that with a 50 million dollar budget more could have been done if proper people who had footballing history and culture were involved.

    also, if anybody has some more details on US youth programs please let me know as i am curious.
     
    SwedishBorn and Sactown Soccer repped this.
  2. Yoshou

    Yoshou Fan of the CCL Champ

    May 12, 2009
    Seattle
    Club:
    Seattle Sounders
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    tl;dr

    But.. Market saturation. We've got 4 major professional leagues that have 30-32 teams each and 2 major amateur leagues with over a hundred teams each.

    That doesn't include the multiple professional soccer leagues that we have easy access to on TV...
     
  3. persianfootball

    persianfootball Member+

    Aug 5, 2004
    outside your realm
    if you actually read my post you would not have made this comment as i addressed/refuted it.
     
    adam tash, Zxcv and Sactown Soccer repped this.
  4. Baysider

    Baysider Member+

    Jul 16, 2004
    Santa Monica
    Club:
    Los Angeles Galaxy
    In our defense, we're pretty good at capitalization.

    There's some good threads around here on the question of how best to structure a soccer league in the US and you might want to join the conversations there. The triplet threads in "You be the Don" are good background, although they've ended. The ongoing one in this forum is good, if wide ranging. The US Nats youth forum have an extensive discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of the US academy system.
     
    BostonRed and persianfootball repped this.
  5. Yoshou

    Yoshou Fan of the CCL Champ

    May 12, 2009
    Seattle
    Club:
    Seattle Sounders
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    No.. you don't. You just dismissed it out of hand by saying there are millions still playing it.. Problem is, those millions of kids are spread across the 3rd largest country and the world.. and they are quite literally spread across most of the country unlike Canada, Russia, and China, whose populations are concentrated in a relatively limited area.

    The problems you noted for Canada exist here as well.. There has been little to no soccer culture. Until relatively recently the only soccer culture was in the immigrant community who are chronically underfunded and suburban white families that view it as little more than a way to distract the kids a few days after school and on the weekends. It's only been in the last 10-15 years that the majority of Americans have had easy access to professional soccer and even less time improving youth soccer to develop players..
     
    El Naranja, owian, bigredfutbol and 2 others repped this.
  6. persianfootball

    persianfootball Member+

    Aug 5, 2004
    outside your realm
    with a population of 320 million and many urban, developed cities, there are enough soccer-fanatics in the USA period. recall my example of bahrain, a tiny country with less than a million people who reached 2 consecutive intercontinental world cup qualifiers.

    and i mostly agree with your second paragraph.
     
  7. When Saturday Comes

    Apr 9, 2012
    Calgary
    Club:
    Toronto FC
    Nat'l Team:
    Canada
    By what metric does India and China have the most die-hard football fans?

    And I question the 'South American Powerhouses still have good management' statement. It runs contrary to every person's account who I've talked to who has seen SA football first hand.
     
  8. persianfootball

    persianfootball Member+

    Aug 5, 2004
    outside your realm
    by the metric known as total population. even if 1% of chinese are football fans that is over 10 million. and surely it is higher than 1%. same with india. you can check the stats to see how much premier league chinese watch for example, thats just one source of evidence if you must. but its just common sense based on observation. its clear that tens of millions of chinese and indians are die hard football fans, which puts them at least on part with any of the other footballing powerhouses.

    thats why i said not infrastructure. also i know they have corruption. its hard to put it into words, but brazil/argentina/uruguay still has SOME superior aspects of management. im sure their youth systems are good at least.
     
  9. EvanJ

    EvanJ Member+

    Manchester United
    United States
    Mar 30, 2004
    Club:
    Manchester United FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Bahrain reached two consecutive intercontinental World Cup qualifiers, but that doesn't mean they were the fifth best in Asia in the 2000s like you said in your first post. To make an estimate, I calculated the average FIFA Rankings for some Asian countries in December of the even-numbered years of the 2000s, which provides eight months:

    Japan: 30.5
    South Korea: 39.9
    Iran: 43.4
    Australia (who joined AFC during the 2000s): 51.3
    Saudi Arabia: 53.4
    Uzbekistan: 72.9
    Bahrain: 100.4

    I found six Asian countries that rank well ahead of Bahrain, and there could be more. Even with another ranking system, if you looked at different times in the 2000s, I doubt Bahrain would be ahead of any of the first five countries I listed. I also think that Bahrain would have been farther away from qualifying for the World Cup if they played in another confederation. Here are the African groups in the final round of qualifying for World Cup 2010 (when Bahrain lost a playoff to New Zealand):

    Group A: Cameroon, Gabon, Togo, and Morocco
    Group B: Tunisia, Nigeria, Mozambique, and Kenya
    Group C: Algeria, Egypt, Zambia, and Rwanda
    Group D: Ghana, Mali, Benin, and Sudan
    Group E: Cote d'Ivoire, Burkina Faso, Guinea, and Malawi

    Do you think Bahrain could have won any of those groups? I don't mean to pick on Bahrain, but they haven't been the fifth best in Asian in the 2000s overall.
     
    SwedishBorn and Yoshou repped this.
  10. bigredfutbol

    bigredfutbol Moderator
    Staff Member

    Sep 5, 2000
    Woodbridge, VA
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Define "die-hard".
     
  11. Potowmack

    Potowmack Member+

    Apr 2, 2010
    Washington, DC
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    What? Man, you must live in a very different Canada from the one I grew up in.

    Soccer will always play second fiddle to hockey in Canada. That's probably the number one reason why Canada does poorly in soccer. Especially since good hockey players share a lot of the same qualities as good soccer players.
     
    SwedishBorn and When Saturday Comes repped this.
  12. persianfootball

    persianfootball Member+

    Aug 5, 2004
    outside your realm
    #12 persianfootball, Sep 19, 2016
    Last edited: Sep 19, 2016
    no offense, but i think i would know more about bahrain than you, because they are also in asia and we have played them numerous times and they have been in our group numerous times.

    australia joined AFC in 2006. so before that, Iran/skorea/japan were the top 3 teams in asia. saudi arabia was crap from 2002 to 2005, rebounding from 2005-2007 then turning crap again. from 2002-2005 and 2007-2010 bahrain was better than saudi arabia. the only other asian team that could have been considered better than bahrain from 2008-2010 was uzbekistan, but they were on par at best. so from 2002-2005 bahrain was the 4rth best in asia, and from 2008-2010 they were the 5th best.

    also, the african discussion is totally irrelevant and hypothetical. even australia would have a 50% chance at best to win any of those groups, let alone bahrain, because african qualifying is retarded in that they have too many groups which results in each group have 1-2 african powers (this is why egypt, although winning many african cups, has not been qualifying to the world cup). 2000s bahrain could have finished 2nd in some of those groups though.
     
  13. persianfootball

    persianfootball Member+

    Aug 5, 2004
    outside your realm
    for the purposes of this discussion, basically any fan who definitively has soccer has their number 1 sport.
     
  14. persianfootball

    persianfootball Member+

    Aug 5, 2004
    outside your realm
    i know people watch hockey a lot here. and also baseball and some basketball. but i mean relative to the USA, canada is not enthusiastic about sports (barring hockey). also, other than hockey, kids here dont really play sports with the ambition of turning professional. its mostly done for fun. canada is not even 10% as competitive as americans when it comes to sports. i have played soccer with americans and they take it very seriously, even though we are just playing for fun. even hockey is only played by rich white kids. also, there is little sport time at schools, and surprisingly not that many facilities at schools (only soccer field, many schools didnt have a basketball net until the late 2000s. but i heard in USA almost all high schools have a pool. but there are so many soccer stadiums here, and they are always empty. if other countries had so many fields they would be using it all the time. the only time a soccer stadium here is used is for under-5 matches in which some kids are running around randomly kicking the ball while there are tons of soccer moms (and dads) sitting in chairs and chilling and yelling "kick."
     
  15. Potowmack

    Potowmack Member+

    Apr 2, 2010
    Washington, DC
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    So, what you're saying is, other than the sport that is a national obsession, Canadians aren't into sports that much. Okay.

    If you want to argue that Canadians are even less into soccer than Americans, that's true. A big part of that has to do with climate.
     
  16. persianfootball

    persianfootball Member+

    Aug 5, 2004
    outside your realm
    #16 persianfootball, Sep 19, 2016
    Last edited: Sep 19, 2016
    yea but it shouldnt be an excuse. just ask iceland.

    another reason USA/canada are not that good is because they are descendants of anglos. anglos are not as good at soccer for whatever reason. look at england, they have rich footballing culture and invented the sport, but they have always been behind the other superpowers, such as brazil, germany, and italy. its just their style of the game i guess, not technical enough. englands futsal team for example is not even top 50 in the world. but then when you look at south america, look at chile for example, its like they were born to play soccer. germans are similar to anglos i know, but they also dont have many technical players, they rely on their teamwork, discipline, and organization. i dont even think germany has a futsal team. i bring up futsal because if you have a good futsal team then you have good technical players. look at players like ronaldinho, they started with futsal. there are no ronaldinho types in england or germany.
     
    monere repped this.
  17. mwulf67

    mwulf67 Member+

    Sep 24, 2014
    Club:
    Chelsea FC
    So basically your argument boils down to white boys can’t play soccer; at least not proper soccer….and when “white” teams do achieve success it not because they are proper “technical” players, but because of devalued “gimmicks” (in your mind) like teamwork, discipline, organization, etc…

    England’s Futsal team ranked 50th which proves all English players are terrible….and yet Chile is ranked 49th and using some kind of convoluted racist logic, Chileans are somehow born to play soccer…
     
  18. Potowmack

    Potowmack Member+

    Apr 2, 2010
    Washington, DC
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Honestly, who cares about futsal? It's about as important to soccer as stickball is to baseball.
     
    mwulf67 repped this.
  19. owian

    owian Member+

    Liverpool FC, San Diego Loyal
    May 17, 2002
    San Diego
    Club:
    Liverpool FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Was going to give a a thoughtful and measured response until I saw this post, which is borderline racist. Any idea that says they aren't good at something because they are descended from someone is not even worth considering in my book.
     
  20. EvanJ

    EvanJ Member+

    Manchester United
    United States
    Mar 30, 2004
    Club:
    Manchester United FC
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    At least in the New York City area, high schools with pools are rare. Nassau County, where I live, has some high school swimming, but I would say fewer than 20 percent of the schools, and possibly fewer than 10 percent, have pools. I don't know where my high school ranks in revenue spent per student, but my high school appears on smartest high schools in the country lists, and it doesn't have a pool. Some areas of New York City are poor enough that they lack educational necessities. If you asked people making budgets for these schools if they had money left over to build a pool, they would laugh at you if you thought a pool was possible. A few years ago I read about children in New York City being shown movies because the school was too poor to teach children to read!

    Without trying to say that one race is better than another, here are the eleven players with the most USMNT caps only including players who got their first cap in the 2000s ordered from most caps to fewest caps:

    1. Landon Donovan
    2. Clint Dempsey
    3. DaMarcus Beasley: visibly dark skin
    4. Michael Bradley
    5. Carlos Bocanegra: his father was Mexican
    6. Tim Howard: half African-American and half Hungarian-American
    7. Jozy Altidore: Haitian-American
    8. Oguchi Onyewu: visibly dark skin
    Tied 9. Jermaine Jones: visibly dark skin
    Tied 9. Pablo Mastroeni: Born in Argentina
    11. Eddie Johnson: visibly dark skin
     
    SwedishBorn repped this.
  21. Elninho

    Elninho Member+

    Sacramento Republic FC
    United States
    Oct 30, 2000
    Sacramento, CA
    Club:
    Los Angeles Galaxy
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Germany doesn't have many technical players? Wait, what? Did you watch the same Euro 2016 and World Cup 2014 that I did?
     
    monere repped this.
  22. Jazzy Altidore

    Jazzy Altidore BigSoccer Yellow Card

    Sep 2, 2009
    San Francisco
    Club:
    Los Angeles Galaxy
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Netherlands share tons of blood and hereditary background with the English and they beg to differ.

    As far as futsal is concerned, it is not very popular in Europe, so not apples with apples.
     
    Elninho repped this.
  23. Potowmack

    Potowmack Member+

    Apr 2, 2010
    Washington, DC
    Club:
    DC United
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    Of course, the conclusion that the US "underperforms" in soccer is highly debatable.

    We're basically where you would expect us to be, based on our soccer history and infrastructure.
     
    TxEx and owian repped this.
  24. Elninho

    Elninho Member+

    Sacramento Republic FC
    United States
    Oct 30, 2000
    Sacramento, CA
    Club:
    Los Angeles Galaxy
    Nat'l Team:
    United States
    #24 Elninho, Sep 20, 2016
    Last edited: Sep 20, 2016
    And since they were mentioned earlier, so are India and China based on their soccer history and infrastructure. Soccer is only the third-most-popular team sport in India, and even today is only highly popular in the northeastern states and in a small radius around Goa. Those areas, home to 10% of India's population, are the birthplaces of two-thirds of the most recent Indian national team roster. And half of the Indian national team players who aren't from those areas have parents from those areas.

    In China, until the early 2000s, soccer was only highly popular in three northeastern provinces and in the relatively cosmopolitan city of Shanghai, and those areas still account for half of the players in the Chinese national team despite being home to less than 10% of China's population. The first generation of Chinese players who grew up with soccer being a reasonably popular sport nationwide are still eligible for the U-20 national team.

    What allows a country to produce great players is not just soccer teams and infrastructure, but density of soccer teams and infrastructure. Argentina can outperform its population because Buenos Aires is a giant metropolis with a lot of clubs, and players develop from playing against strong local opposition on a regular basis. There's great soccer infrastructure in the US if you look at the US as a country, but there isn't a concentration of great infrastructure in any part of the US.
     
  25. persianfootball

    persianfootball Member+

    Aug 5, 2004
    outside your realm
    thats simply not true. many players start with futsal... it is essential the same sport but in tight spaces... this means it requires more technique.... especially in regards to ball control and dribbling. there is a correlation. there are exceptions, such as germany and england, which prove that futsal is not "necessary" to achieve footballing success, but it definitely can be helpful.
     
    Sactown Soccer repped this.

Share This Page