Albion, Jacksonville, United Futbol, and Virginia Development Academy only have teams up to the U16/17 level. They don't have U18/19 teams yet. It looks like the Scott Gallaghers have united for the U18/19, U16/17, and U15 levels as Saint Louis FC academy, but now have separate Illinois and Missouri teams at the U14 and U13 levels. There are more happenings at the lower levels described here: http://www.ussoccerda.com/20170203-development-academy-expansion-announcement That announcement doesn't mention the St Louis merger, but it seems to imply its existence; the chart shows the U18 division growing by only one club despite the addition of NYCFC and Grande Sports Academy. Other observations Minnesota United will have its first two teams next season, at the U13 and U14 levels. IIRC they are eventually partnering with Shattuck St Mary's, who have teams at the U15, U16, and U18 levels. Cincinnati and San Antonio are getting DA representation, though only at the U12, U13, and U14 levels. South Carolina Battery dropped out of the DA after the 2015-16 season; SC is getting a DA team again at the U12 level only with Discoveries SC. However, they are based in a suburb of Charlotte rather than an unserved part of the state. The Pac NW is now represented at the U13 and U14 levels as many of the U12-only clubs have entered teams in older age groups (though the Sounders aren't going younger than U15 for whatever reason).
Newest DA club: FC Barcelona. You may have heard of them. https://www.fcbarcelona.com/club/ne...-world-create-residential-academy-arizona-usa
The connection is the Grande Sports World organization. They have a lot of existing facilities, which is why RSL partnered with them for their residential academy. However, RSL is moving back to Utah because they are building a lot of infrastructure of their own. We knew GSW was going to stay in the DA in some capacity; obviously, this is a new twist.
I'm VERY curious how MLS academies are reacting behind the scenes to US Soccer letting FCB into the highest youth division. They can't be happy.
I think this is great news. MLS is too insulated. Somewhat built on that. It kills competition. Having Barca come in who know what they're doing offers some real competition right here in our backyard. I hope more Euro clubs do this. This is just phenomenal. They'll have residency. This offers opportunities to players who want to bypass MLS' territorial restrictions. Live in SF and don't like the Earthquakes academy(who would?) and have legit talent, go to residency in AZ with Barca and get a top footballing education. I've felt for awhile when we finally have a few top academies that we'd want all our top talent gravitating to those academies. MLS restrictions don't allow it. This however presents another opportunity never mind the global connections to those who'd truly impress.
Pretty excited about this as well, although I'd like to hear more details on what percentage of academy spots will be free/subsidized. Regardless, a top team like FC Barcelona investing in US youth development in a more significant way (i.e. not a camp or minor endeavor whose primary purpose is to promote the brand) is further evidence of progress. Here's another article with some additional details: Source: https://www.topdrawersoccer.com/clu...-barcelona-announce-historic-academy_aid41935
Yes. Skeptical that this end up being anything other than an expensive pay for play academy with a residency options marketed by Barca because that is pretty much what Grande Sports is for the most part from everything that I can gather. I am sure their will be some type of scholarships, but unless it is primarily free/subsidized then it really isn't all that great of an option for anybody outside fringe talented kids with rich parents or local kids.
Wouldn't all of them be free. If FCB doesn't offer it free and MLS clubs do how is that true competition. Pay for Play Barcelona style.
Check out @ussoccer_acad's Tweet: There you have it! The full group listing👇🏽 for the U-15/16 #AcademyPlayoffs. The U-17/18 draw will begin shortly! 🏆 pic.twitter.com/BxhirAf4wr— Development Academy (@ussoccer_da) June 7, 2017 Check out @ussoccer_acad's Tweet: That concludes the U-17/18 #AcademyPlayoffs draw. 👀 where your team landed 👇🏽. pic.twitter.com/BMjvCZowNL— Development Academy (@ussoccer_da) June 7, 2017
The problem is what will happen when these players ready to leave. What is Barcelona's solution? Players are mostly barred from entering MLS once they want to if they are spending most of their development in Barcelona's USA academy.
When are these games and will they be televised? Those groups are completely lopsided in the U-17/18 division. B, C and H are incredibly hard, the rest are not.
If they are good enough, they can enter the draft. Or they can go play for a USL team if they are good enough. Or, they can do college for 1-4 years and then do MLS or USL... or trial elsewhere in the world and try to latch on somewhere.
I think the Sounders Academy gets overlooked quite a bit lately for what they are doing. The saying they use is, "If you are good enough, you are old enough" https://www.soundersfc.com/post/201...longed-third-place-finish-manchester-city-cup The Sounders U-14s took 3rd in the Manchester City Cup. Sounders FC 3 vs. Manchester City 2 (5/25/17) Sounders FC 5 vs. Pateadores 0 (5/26/17) Sounders FC 4 vs. Club America 4, 6-5 loss on PKs (5/28/17) Sounders FC 2 vs. Tottenham Hotspur 2. 5-3 win on PKs (5/29/17) And a player to keep an eye on is Afonso Ocampo-Chavez. He had a first half hat trick against Club America in the tournament. It sounds like the Sounders think this 2002 class is their best ever in terms of the quantity of quality talent. -- I also enjoyed this recent article. https://www.soundersfc.com/post/2017/05/30/sounders-fc-academy-trio-called-us-soccer-futures-camp One of the players highlighted, Serrano, is from my home town of Spokane and came to the Sounders as a result of their partnership with a long time youth club in the city. As mentioned in the article, he quickly impressed and moved up to the U-15s and then the U-16s where he showed well in the Generation Adidas Cup. Can read up on the academy's recent results and some highlights of what is going on in the academy here. https://www.soundersfc.com/topics/academy They have some young CBs coming up through the system too that are showing quite well while playing up in age groups. Sam Rogers who starts for S2 right now and Sakari Carter who is a U-16 playing up with the U-18s. https://www.soundersfc.com/post/2017/06/06/academy-snapshot-u-18s-u-16s-look-towards-playoffs I think it may have been like a 10 match unbeaten run. So no small feat.
You have to join a team's academy before signing a homegrown contract. You could go into the draft, but why should a player have to wait until the draft? Ebobisse had to wait half a season to join MLS because he had to wait until the draft. Not really any great solution, unless a player is good enough to go to Europe. Draft is once a year in January. Players could be waiting half a year, like Ebobisse did after exiting college soccer. A player can sign in USL, you are right, but I'm not sure thats a great solution for the best players. College is not an option for the best players, unless they don't want to be the best players in a few years or they are GK's. I think there would need to be a better solution, otherwise I don't want them to be getting the best players. They need an avenue to join an MLS team's first team roster whenever they want to.
I agree with this. Really underrated academy. Between Morris, Carter, Rogers, Muse, Gonzalez, Ocampo-Chavez, Atencio, Robles, etc, thats an academy with some pretty good talents. I hope they sign some of these guys to their first team soon enough. I believe the only player right from their academy to their first team was Mansaray.
There is no solution. 99.9% of the players at this academy will never play for Barcelona. Hence why all sorts of iterations such as this with other Euro clubs (Ajax Orlando) haven't been long-lasting. Even an actual MLS club like ChivasUSA couldn't funnel talent to their parent club. Its a real challenge. They will invest a lot, and get very little out of it. Not only will the youngsters not be able to move to Spain until they're 18 (unless they have a foreign passport like Pulisic), but there are some pretty strict limits on foreign players for Spanish teams. Hence why previous youngsters went to Spain, but had to be loaned out almost instantly. The best example of that was Danny Szetela. Villarreal had to loan out Jozy because all of their foreign player slots were full. HOWEVER, the way I view it this club will be no different than all of the non-MLS academy clubs out there. Pulisic, Sargent, Akale, and plenty of our other elite youth talents didn't play in MLS academies and found their way to the pros. Some find their way to MLS clubs. MLS figures these things out on the fly like they were trying to do by assigning Sargent's homegrown rights to SKC............................ Barcelona have the money to spend. And if they get one Christian Pulisic out of it, then it may be worth it.
The logical thing to do, if this Barca academy is going to have an annual budget comparable to what the better MLS academies spend each year (at least around $1.5 to $2 million), is to go all-in on recruiting players who have EU passports.
And a lot of it is because we have a completely different sporting system than the rest of the World. Ajax were able to set up Ajax Cape Town but, were not able to get Ajax Orlando off the ground.
But what has Ajax Cape Town actually delivered in terms of talent? Many, many non-MLS academies in this country have relationships with foreign club teams. These relationships allow for trips overseas for the youth and coaches. An example is Solar Chelsea in DFW. The Dallas Texans had a relationship with ManUnited (don't know if they still do). And they allow the foreign clubs to do a little scouting of American youth. I'm going to say something folks aren't going to like.........................Barcelona would be better served by simply increasing their scouting network in the US than spending millions on their own academy. Barca could have acquired Pulisic just like Dortmund did.
I'm sure you are right in what Barcelona's aim is, but if thats their approach, I hope talented kids aren't flocking to their academy.
Cotonou players count as domestics in Spain, a second passport from many Caribbean or African countries would do the trick as well. Agree with the general sentiment being expressed in this thread that it's a quixotic venture given the practical realities.