The American system is a failure right now. I've written on this in the past. Young players are encouraged to play on high school teams and then college teams. They don't get enough games against good competition this way. Sure there are some elite youth teams that can add extra games but IMO, it's best that a player move to Europe at as young an age as possible. I think John O'Brien moved to Ajax when he was 17. Christian Pulicic moved to Dortmund when he was 16. Of course this is going to be a huge change for the kid but in terms of improving talent wise it's the best way to go. Klinsman is correct on this point and it's why he's looking for all the Germans who have an American parent that he can find. They are just better football players than what we have here in the US. Every now and then we will come up with a Donavan or Dempsey but it's too much hit and miss. I've been watching MLS ever since it was created over 20 years ago and regularly attend DC United matches. The overall quality of play is just a shade below the English Championship League level. There are some standout players but 90% of the Americans could not start for a mid-table Dutch team and forget any of the big three clubs. Most of the young Latin players referred to are not good enough to play in a higher league. Don't you think that world wide scouting would have already picked these guys up? We've had a number of such players at DC United and some have been good and others s0=so. We have an undersized Argentinian now who cannot play first team football in his home country. He has good ball skills but he is only 1.57m in height. If the US only could pick American players from MLS for their NT they would have trouble qualifying. One of the best midfielders on the NT is Jermaine Jones who is too old and slow to play for Schalke any longer but he's a star in MLS!!! The CONCACAF CL is a joke. My club has participated in it several times over the years and amazingly won it back in 1998 when it was a much smaller competition. DC United dominated the league in those early years having several US NT players on the roster along with 3 Latin players who all played for their NTs. It was an anomaly at the time and only the LA Galaxy won in 2000. Since then it's been a disaster for MLS teams. Because the MSL schedule is a spring-summer league they are at a disadvantage when they have to play a CL game in February or March as their season is not yet underway.
Delusional post of the year. You're saying that some of the countries that produce the elite footballers for the top four european leagues are not good enough for most of the MLS players to evolve? You really think that 98% of the american players in your league are above the best crop that the portuguese league has to offer? Portugal alone has some of the best scouting networks worldwide (as well as of now generating 2 golden generations in the process) and you don't believe we would of snapped a few of your "talents" if they were that good? In what world do you live in?
Wow, what's with the hatred, dude? Get a life. I never said that 98% of US players are above the level of the Portuguese league. Benfica, FC Porto, and Sporting Lison are probably worth playing for provided the US player doesn't sit on the bench all season. Anyway, other than with the top 3 clubs, it is delusional to think that the Portuguese league would be better for developing US talent than Major League Soccer. How many USAmericans speak Portuguese? What is wrong with USAmericans playing in their domestic league? It's all about the money. Each league has its small pool of rich clubs that can buy in talent and occasionally develop in their youth system. But why should a US player skip his own domestic league to go play for some lower-level team in a foreign country unless it is one of the top leagues in the world? MLS is expanding like crazy and the talent pool is small so there are opportunities for USAmericans to play in the USA. If any US player is good enough to make a top European club, then they should try for it. But I don't see how Jozy Altidore sitting on the Villareal bench helped his development. Likewise, someone mentioned John O'Brien. Yeah, where in the hell did he end up? Certainly didn't turn into a world class player. John O'Brien's career Years Team Apps† (Gls)† 1998–2005 Ajax 63 (3) 1998–1999 → Utrecht (loan) 19 (2) 2005–2006 ADO Den Haag 3 (0) 2006 Chivas USA 1 (0) Total 86 (5) Three goals for Ajax. And then on to those European powerhouses FC Utrecht and ADO Den Haag. It is too bad John wasn't born a bit later because he could have had a nicer career in MLS. Only 86 matches in total.
I concur with your observations about the high school -> college route not being the best way to develop futbol talent. That is why we are seeing growth in club academies and in the pro leagues. What are there now, four levels of pro leagues? But as I said above, the talent pool is still small for US players so we are seeing many young players from other countries come in. For sure they are not the best in the world, since the richer European clubs would have those on their books already. But we are getting some of the best young talent from CONCACAF and South America. Just check some of the MLS rosters and you will see national squad members from several countries. But I do not concur that the US system is a failure. This is MLS's 20th season and the league is as strong as it has ever been. I watch many matches on MLS live and see good attendances. Seattle and Portland are consistently sold out and Orlando and New York City are in the top five of attendance even only in their second season. I believe that MLS will bypass the leagues of most other countries within a few years as more money comes into the sport. I don't think MLS will surpass the English Premier League (or Championship), nor those of Germany, Italy, Spain, Argentina, Brazil, or Mexico, but I would argue that other leagues are fairly stagnant relative to MLS. For example, other than Ajax, PSV, or Feyenoord, which Dutch Eredivisie clubs draw the support that Seattle, Portland, or Orlando do? Is the Eredivisie in ascendance or ailing? I have followed Feyenoord since 1996 and can tell you, they lose academy players at a much earlier age now than they did 20 years ago. The $illy money Brit clubs can buy youngsters by the bunches and stick them in reserve squads. Like angel investors, maybe only 1 out of 8 or 10 will eventually make the first squad but the "investment" will have paid off. The others slink back to their home countries and join lower-level squads. I could give many examples from the Eredivisie alone. Some day, US fans will support their own home-grown squads and stop jumping on the worldwide band wagon of fans of ManU, Chelsea, Bayern Munich, Barcelona, Real Madrid, etc. ad nauseam. I will probably have jumped off the Feyenoord bandwagon by that time. Getting tired of 3rd place, I am.
To be fair, O'Brien was one of our best players in '02 and looked destined for a long career at Ajax or a club of that level. But then he got hurt (iirc, he developed an injury due to one leg being slightly longer than the other which built up over time) and was never the same since. So I don't think his dropoff came from a lack of ability but from injury.
I know he had some kind of injury that he never quite recovered from. He was a key player for the US in the 2002 World Cup where he started in the midfield.
there already is a fair amount of money in MLS. DC United has had a couple of big pocket owners. One dropped out when the team did not get approval for the first stadium site as he was real estate investor and wanted a big land deal from the city to develop the surrounding properties. Attendance at DC United matches has dropped off a little bit and maybe it will rebound when the new stadium is ready in a couple of years. A bigger problem, IMO, is that the summer heat in many of the US cities is not good for soccer. It's way too hot and humid even during night matches. I remember an Ajax/DC United friendly about five or so years ago that was played at 1600 in the afternoon and it was really uncomfortable. It was a week after the Ajax season ended and the players were really huffing and puffing after the first half hour.
Yeah, the summer season is problematic at places like Houston and Orlando but evening matches are the way to go although humidity will be high. I think that MLS went to a summer season for two main reasons. First, they are only going up against Major League Baseball during the summer and that is favorable with us fans who don't like the languid pace at which baseball is played. You know that a normal match will be done within 2 hours whereas the length of baseball games is unknown. Second, a season that includes the winter months of December, January, and February is unrealistic with most northern tier sites. In northern Europe some leagues take a winter break (e.g., Eredivisie in January). Don't the Scandinavian leagues play through the summer months also?
^^Yes, Scandinavian leagues play part of the summer as does the Russian league. You're right about the winter months and they would have to take a longer break than just January as February can be brutally cold in a number of MSL cities.
Also, they'd be going up against the NBA and, more importantly, the NFL in the winter. Sent from my SM-T550 using Tapatalk
The regular season ends in December before most of the real cold weather has settled in. Only those teams making the playoffs have to deal with the bad weather. Some of the teams have domed stadiums such as Detroit but Green Bay, New England, New York, Buffalo, and Kansas City are open air. There have been some amazingly cold play off games in Green Bay over the years. The 1967 playoff game against Dallas was played in frigid weather, the temperature at game time was -26C They didn't have the type of performance fabrics that we have today and you can see the steam coming out of the mouths when the players and supporters breath. There have been some very cold games in Minnesota over the years as well.
The MLS is not near the standard of Eredivisie, Jupiler, La Ligue 1, etc. Not sure why you are being so dismissive of those leagues as they have loads of talent. They just don't have the money to compete with the top European leagues and their talent tends to move up the ladder to the more challenging leagues. You could take all the talent of MLS and it wouldn't be close to Anderlecht, Ajax or PSV.
Canada's representative at the 2017 CCL will actually have numerous Canadians starting, if they stay. This batch will I am sure, but we are seeing more Canadian talent follow the fizzle out route overseas. Their name gets lost and their talent fades on the bench.