Just posting this for informational purposes, not to start any mud slinging. This is current to date numbers on the 08s. Galaxy and Indy Premiere make up a decent chunk of the GA numbers as well.
Im pretty sure they are estimating that 81% of "Power 4" spots are taken. And 35% of all the rosters are filled.
FCU seems to have had a solid recruiting class based on their posts. However, these stats highlight that top clubs are still primarily ECNL (just look at the app rankings). That said, being at a decent GA club can still provide good prospects, though there aren’t many strong GA clubs left. Ultimately, you’re better off at a club like Indy Premier, Galaxy, or FCU for D1 college placements than at clubs like Sporting Blue Valley or Sporting Iowa.
I have been watching Chicagoland soccer for 30+ years. Seen some great players come through. I have also listened to a lot of parents stress over placing their player in the right league, right club, etc. Here's my honest advice. From ages 5-9 let the kid play in any convenient recreation league. Maybe even just pickup ball. Think 2 practices a week + 1 game max. If he/she loves the game it will be evident. If so then sign em up for indoor small sided games as well (3v3, futsal, etc.) Let them just PLAY. If still in love, at age 10 pick a local travel team. Make it convenient so that traveling to training/games does not consume the family's life or wallet. Does not have to be special coaching or league. Now for the rub >>> In addition, focus on individual training mostly from 10-14. This is where the real work and development comes in. Develop foot skills with both feet. Pay a group/indv trainer once a week but the player must do the homework daily. Think repetition. This is EVERYTHING until age 14. With the developed skill set and ability to create space at age 14, your player will be ready for the higher level league/clubs that will teach 1&2 touch, scanning the field, soccer IQ on early solving, spacing and defensive formation, set pieces, etc. Most parents of elite players make the mistake of doing this last step too early. High level academies (especially MLS) are wonderful for later years but can also kill individual creativity/skill too soon. Keep this in mind in planning development for the elite player and don't get sucked into thinking you have to get to the best of the best as soon as possible. It can be counter productive to development and love of the game. Good luck parents!
Pay a trainer for a 10-14 year old, and make sure they train daily? I don't agree with that at all. There is no template for success.
Honestly don’t even have to pay a trainer. There’s tons of good information available online. Just need a good filter. However, yes must train daily from ages 10-14 to become elite. Soccer is not like most hand sports and the feet take lots of reps. Especially the weak foot. Again this is for elite player development. Rec ball, low ceiling development requires little training and just a love for the game. Totally fine as well! Rec ball encompasses 99% of players.
Any of the Chicagoans know anything about Kevin Gowrie? He ran Team Chicago Boys for a couple seasons and then FC United boys program before moving to Milwaukee. Asking because he runs the boys program closest to my home and my daughter could use an extra session on her clubs off days this winter or until March or something.
Yep- before he went "big time" he was a club coach and DOC at our local club. He was very well-liked and trained the kids well with a great developmental model/philosophy. My oldest is in college now but he was her academy coach before she moved clubs, my youngest (HS now) never had him except for when he came up to help with an occasional summer soccer camp when she was young before moving clubs and loved him. He knows what he's doing on both the boys AND girls side of the game.
It sounds like it's going to the youth basketball model, where while there is some correlation/consistency across sanctioning bodies and regions; there is individual flexibility to do whatever the heck you want with cut-off dates - which includes whatever level of compliance/enforcement one chooses.
It will happen next year. ECNL wanted it, but couldn't do it alone. It needed other leagues to go along with them. The problem turned out to be, not all of the leagues were immediately set up to do it and make the switch. Teams in California are getting ready to have their for next season in a months time. They told the ECNL that while some could handle it, many of the clubs who have teams on multiple leagues could not make the switch clean. So the compromise was to tell everyone it will happen, but everyone has a year to get their ducks in a row and to be ready for the switch heading into the fall of '26. It was more of a time crunch than anything else. This was known and done since the second week of November.
Matko is back as the head coach of Chicago Fire 2. Several high school aged players get good minutes on that team. Nice to have one of the OG youth coaches back in the mix.
That's the MLSNext Pro team? He had been coaching (at least as of 2021-23, give or take) at CIU. One of my kids played for him a bit.
It is the u23/Reaerves MLS Next Pro. Combination of youth players, young pros and veterans hanging onto their career
From the outside looking in, the Fire's academy seems like such an odd animal. It produces some talent and some of it obviously makes the first team (or gets sold on to bigger thinbs), but I can't tell if it's a real priority or just something that has some success in spite of indifference from the club.
I meant to post this last week but got busy at work. It looks like most of the U15-U19 girls ECNL season is over except for Minnesota Thunder games. I created a spreadsheet for each team and the league as a whole to see how teams were doing. My takeaways: 1. Are there too many Michigan teams? Hawks Magic and Midwest United both struggled. You could put Liverpool in there as well. 5 Michigan teams and 3 Illinois teams. Posters here have talked about the Illinois player pool being diluted. Probably not as much as Michigan. 2. FC Wisconsin - 12 wins total and 7 of those coming from their U15 team. 3. SLSG and Michigan Hawks second teams really seem to be struggling. Time to get rid of second teams in the league? 4. After one full year Chicago Inter has already jumped past Rockford but not by much. Eclipse is still top dog but Nationals has already jumped ahead of them in their first year. What does that say about them? Maybe not as scientific as having a fancy app but this seems to say a lot about the clubs/individual teams.
Thanks for taking the time to put this together. It supports the reality that a top level GA team can compete with the top of the ECNL. Just a alphabet soup..... Try to convince me that the whole youth soccer model is broken and there shouldn't be a vertical platform with Pro/Rel.
If you overlay those ratings for the ECNL ages with the overall SR club rating, here's what it looks like. No real surprises, but would want to look deeper at Midwest United, as overall for the 7 team ages they show better than what the ratings in the custom spreadsheet would imply. Sorted by the Position in the spreadsheet first, then by SR Club rating.
That’s not how I see it. You took the very best GA club (Nationals) — teams that dominated their conferences, won National Championships, reached finals last year, or have championship histories — and added them into the Midwest Conference. Despite this, their highest-ranked team is sitting in 3rd place, with the 09s in 6th. To me, this shows that only the absolute top of the GA can compete with the top of the ECNL, which isn’t surprising. No one expects the lower-tier ECNL teams to match up against the best in the GA either. Since GA is the second-best league, it would be surprising if none of its elite teams could be competitive in ECNL. Nationals haven’t proven they can dominate the ECNL yet, but they’ve shown that one of the country’s most well-structured clubs can hold its own across multiple age groups in the highly competitive Midwest ECNL conference. The real test will be the playoffs, where we’ll see how many of their teams reach the finals.
Meh ... Nationals for each age group. Nobody ever doubted that they could compete. I predicted at the start of the season that they would be middle of the standings. 07s - 8th 08s - 3rd 09s - 6th 10s - 3rd 11s - 3rd 12s - 8th While all of their teams will go to playoffs in some fashion, the 9s and the 7s are not competing for any sort of title. They will be in the showcases. Nationals as a program is great though. But we all knew that. Mandatory 4 day week for them and their kids are not allowed to play H.S. soccer. I think their 8s have the best chance and getting out of the championship group at playoffs, but even that is close. Nationals coaches could not be more happy about them making the switch behind the scenes and are using this to fuel to their girls that they need to get better. I still wholeheartedly believe that promotion and relegation for kids is stupid and also not actually something that can be accomplished in youth soccer. I also am a firm believer that wins for kids are almost useless. But that's just me.