Wednesday 13 Oct 2021

The club that introduced the world to Pelé, Brazil's Santos Futebol Clube.*

* Or, was it the other way around?

 

If you read one soccer article this decade, this is the one. It’s the opposite of a polemic…it looks at US youth development through every lens possible. Brilliant piece of journalism. Asks (almost) all the right questions, doesn’t have heroes or villains.

The one issue I would have liked to see a few paragraphs on was what impact the potential for soccer scholarships has on MLS and the foreign club academies.

 

Not MLS related (yet):

Kevin Hubbell, one of the best players in Michigan, scored 16 goals in Benzie Central’s 17-0 victory over Kingsley last month, setting state and national records for the most goals in a high school game.

The parents on the other team were unhappy. There's no mercy rule in soccer.

Link

 

Rather than bemoan the fact that Euro clubs are making inroads into US developmental circles and potentially poaching some kids - which we don't have to like but can't do much about - MLS should be doing exactly the same thing in the Caribbean.

Youth programs across the region are wildly underfunded, clubs don't have money for their first teams let alone the youth, federations are (with some exceptions) run by thieves, grifters and/or rapists, and the caliber of coaching makes most US community youth leagues look like French academy ball.

For a comparatively minor investment MLS - collectively - could establish youth programs on half a dozen islands, start scooping up the most promising ones at a tender age, provide them with real quality training and if they develop pro potential toss them into the Superdraft or use a system similar to the allocation list.

For the ones who don't quite cut it there are plenty of NCAA programs that they would be thrilled to join. Currently, in many places across the region, an American scholarship offer is the Holy Grail.

As it is, MLS has suspended the combine they used to conduct every year looking for talent because it produced nothing. IIRC four years of that got a grand total of one kid drafted. They show up with all the athletic talent in the world but as green as grass and raw to the bone and simply unprepared. Many have literally never had a single day of professional training.

Best of all, aside from locating some young talent on the relative cheap, it would help improve the dreadful level of many of the regions national teams.

MLS is in a unique position to do this kind of thing because they can spread the costs out across 27 teams. A drop in the bucket. Find a sponsor or two and it costs zero. European clubs cant do it because the density of the potential player pool is too small to make it worthwhile for one single club.

It would be leveraging the single entity concept in a creative way. Imagine that.

 

Unfortunately, this is (at least at first glance) both so simple and brilliant that I don't have much faith the league would get it done.

 

I have been both on the losing and the winning side of that type of equation multiple times as a coach and as a player, but never to that scale. Benzie's coach should have pulled the kid off after 5 goals, and Kingsley's coach should have pulled 2 forwards back to "ghost" the big goal-scorer if said scorer was left on the field.

At 8-0 or so, the Benzie coach should have instructed his team no more shots until 10 passes were completed or some such delay instruction.

A 17-0 victory in footy will definitely get the Benzie coach a talking-to from the league and the district about the principles of Fair Play.

 

This is why I liked coaching lacrosse. We had a team do that to us with the best offensive player in the district, and my coaching response was to use my full rotation of defenders to slash the crap out of him until the coach sat him down. We just beat him up, without causing injury, until the coach realized that running plays for him with a 14-3 lead in the 4th quarter wasn't going to fly. I don't know if there's a soccer equivalent for that without risking injuring the player.

 

My sister played JV on one of the best high school teams in the state (Hope Solo was the varsity starting keeper for the high school around that time). They had a rule, even at JV, that after a 5 goal lead all shots had to be with the off foot. After a 10 goal lead they all had to be headers. One of the couple games I was able to go to (I was already in college at this point) one of the JV reserves got into a blowout and forgot the rules, and scored her first goal. Everyone congratulated her for her first goal, but the coach still subbed her out and sat her down for forgetting the rule. (He put her back in after a few minutes)

 

The ugly side of it is how MLB exploits the Caribbean and South America. Furthermore, MLB can pay and develop players at a young age there while they restrict young American players from the same access.

Thx,

Jay!

 

Not at all soccer related, but probably the best news we'll get today:

William Shatner finally went to space.
https://www.theverge.com/2021/10/13/22724058/blue-origin-william-shatner-new-shepard-flight-success

 

I hope no one in space asks for his wallet.

 

Back in my HS and club days, I was a high-effort, medium-to-high-speed, low-to-medium foot skill player - but because of my size and frame and effort level, I usually served as our team's enforcer. Granted, this was back in the 70s and 80s, but if someone was taking too many liberties, coach would send me out to ensure that the opposing player had...fewer opportunities to do damage to us. Yes, a lot of physical contact was involved. There were hip checks, full shoulder charges, and even the occasional scissor slide (always getting the ball first, of course). Never any serious injuries, and not all the time 100% successful mind you, and some of the techniques I used would be very much frowned upon in the modern game. But it is true that opposing players can do far less damage to your team when they are laying on the grass wondering WTF just ran into them.

This is something that that young lad (and his coach) from the school in Michigan had better take to heart very quickly - because guys who score 16 goals in a game inevitably become the guys with targets on their backs from lunkheads like me.

 

Nobody should be bemoaning it. It happens globally. It also makes our domestic game and ultimately our national team stronger when talented kids get top level coaching.

And MLS is responding in a way via the young designated player program. Atlanta got Barco, NYCFC got Magno, who was one of The Guardian's to 60 young footballers to watch last year, putting him in the same class as Pulisic, de la Fuente and...oh dear... Andrew Carleton.

MLS has a global scouting network, so teams have the reputation to compete with La Liga and Liga MX academies in Central America?

 

I was disappointed that he didn't come back with tribbles.

4 or 5 year-olds could be traumatized by getting drubbed but for teenagers it's just a life lesson.

I captained my school's makeshift rugby union team against a team of teachers, several of whom played for a local club. At 66-0 they took their feet off the gas and we even scored a last minute try.

There were no parents watching and no-one needed hugs.

My record loss was at rugby league, when I played at East London ARLFC. We lost 96-6 to a team of kiwis, who played rugby union competitively on Saturdays and rugby league as a hobby on Sundays.

 

Commissioner Garber: MLS' 30th team will be announced in the next 12 months
By MLSsoccer staff
Wednesday, Oct 13, 2021, 03:54 PM

 

That's a whole lot of 60-90 days.

 

At age 90, I'm thrilled he came back.

 

Bill, there are a lot of good people doing their best to give kids the opportunity to play soccer, for very little reward and it costs them a lot of money just to get certified.

 

I used to broadcast high school sports, and doing games like this were a nightmare! You really have to be creative to hold the audience's interest when you might be bored to tears yourself. Worst drubbing I ever called was an 85-17 boys basketball game. It was a 7-team regional tournament, and the #2 seed won the game in a rout over the 7th seed.

 

Bold prediction: It ain't gonna be Sacramento.

I hope Ron Burkle goes on a 10-mile hike in the woods and gets violated by a gonorrheic bear.

 

Burkle isn't the issue. He's successfully bought into franchises in Pittsburgh and San Diego now.