Apples to oranges. That is a bad comparison. The # 63 national team in the world is still made up of elite professionals and is much closer in ability to #1 than the 63rd ranked us youth team, lmfao. usa youth soccer has enormous gaps in talent, coaching, roster quality and competition, so rankings need to move more sharply. FIFA is ranking teams within a much narrower elite pool and is designed to reward sustained results, not completely reorder the table after one good tournament. Cape Verde moving four spots shows the results mattered. It does not prove FIFA ignored them, and it definitely does not prove a youth app is more accurate. If you are suggesting that since cape verde tied two great teams they are suddenly top ten I dont know what to tell you. rankings are just rankings and will never capture the spirit, effort or magic that can happen in a soccer game.
I wondered if this were actually true, so I just picked an age group, 2009 girls (incoming seniors). #1 team in SoccerRankings: Solar SC ECNL. Results from a showcase earlier this year show a 2-1 victory against Rockford Raptors FC ECNL (currently ranked #79, predicted result 78% win by Solar) and a 0-0 tie against FC Stars Blue (#33, 74% predicted win). Odds before the Argentina–Cape Verde game implied win > 88%. So, maybe it isn't such a crazy comparison after all. #1 vs #63 international elite pros and #1 vs #63 high school kids are both pretty big mismatches but also totally possible to win, if things work out just right. Absolutely true.
Lower rated teams always get up to play the national powerhouse teams. Showcase games for most elite teams, especially ones like Solar, mean fairly even playing time to ensure proper minutes across a stacked roster in front of college coaches. It’s simply not a competitive league game. I’m not saying the teams aren’t trying but it’s different. If Rockford played 7 league games vs Solar, I’d be surprised if Rockford would win more than one.
They certainly finished strong. #1 rated U16G GA team in the country, and finished the season by proving it.
Question - both old and new... How have Raiders FC got it so right so often? They seem like such a small club but yet have produced some talented boys teams. They have also produced some good players that have moved to the larger clubs. I admit to knowing nothing about them other than seeing teams pop up at the top of the heap over the course of my time here (2010-present). What's the special sauce?
I would add that Illinois Magic are also finding success as a small club. What are these clubs doing that seems to work?
TYLER works them at Illinois Magic! I wish my son would have worked with him more when he was younger.
I only bring these clubs up because as with every mens World Cup, we find ourselves discussing the failed system (youth) in this country. Perhaps it's time for the big guys to understand what some of these little guys are doing and make changes. I know from my experience at Sockers (big guy), that they were not developing on the girls side of the house. Sure organically perhaps - pre-2005 when the girls trained with the boys and played in the NISL. But that is by no means an accolade that can be placed on the training/ideolgy and so on. The majority of players (80-99%) for many teams came to the club from other clubs - already understanding 1v1 and basic technical skills. What Sockers did was refine the type of play. That said - how does a club like Sockers integrate what these smaller clubs are doing to actually develop their own players on a larger scale? This is not to ignore the elephant in the room which is the cost to play and how massively that impacts potential talent who can barely afford the cheapest of shoes. Lastly, I think clubs should introduce (free) open play. Coaches can supply the field space, pinnies and seperate the teams so that they are as even as possible. Coaches can manage time but there is no coaching - other than coaches encouraging players to try something new and take risks! Open play should also be a platform where non-club kids can come and play for free. That could enable clubs to identify talent - especially kids who cannot afford the cost of club play.
Likely co-favorites for the World Cup next year so development seems to be fine. USA men beat the teams they should have beaten and lost to the team that had more talent and superior tactics. But guess what the same can be said about Mexico and England and a bunch of other teams at this World Cup. Germany has done nothing since they won the World Cup. Italy hasn’t made the last 3.
IMO, at the youth level, we need to have one combined league with however many tiers necessary and (optional) promotion and relegation between them all. Get kids playing at an appropriate competitive level instead of bad ECNL/MLS Next and good RL/AD teams being separated. Teams/kids will know where they stand in the hierarchy, and it will give them something to play for. This should also condense travel requirements. Maybe tier 3 or 4 or 5 is where it cuts off at being a Regional Champion vs. some kind of National thing. In addition, we need to upgrade our basketball courts to be hybrid futsal/basketball (or build futsal only courts) in as many places as possible. Maybe that's every other suburb in a ring around a metro area, but ideally, somewhere where the soccer-minded kids in an area can get to easily that is a smaller area (ideally, with fenced/walled in to some extent). My kids can get 6-8 somewhat regularly to go up to the local high school field when it's not being used, but they're limited in the type of fun/competitive games they can do on a full-size field with full-size goals.
Some half-formed thoughts: I've been a longtime believer in a single pyramid with pro/rel. However, thinking about it recently, there are a few questions that I would have, especially with pro/rel. First, we all complain about focusing too early on winning and not enough on development. Will pro/rel just make it worse? Second, how will pro/rel work if players can so easily jump teams as soon as their team gets relegated (or players could get cut for club hoppers from elsewhere as soon as their team gets promoted). Finally, how can pro/rel work with a "club" league model. The club model does offer some logistical benefits, such that coaches and families with multiple kids playing in the club can align travel. It also (theoretically) offers a way to have a bit of a player pool, e.g., ECNL and ECRL teams can travel together and do some player swapping on a relatively ad hoc basis, which, if handled properly, can be beneficial to players. As for futsal, a lot of American youth players (around here, at least) don't seem to like it all that much. Maybe in part it's a "not used to it" thing, or maybe it's because futsal has a steep technical learning curve. Multi-sport players who don't spend their off-seasons working on technique tend to struggle a lot more in futsal than in full-field soccer for the obvious reasons. Some of those players focus their winters on playing basketball anyway. So, my question is, there really that much demand for futsal?
The fragmented pay-to-play model is the same for both men's and women's soccer in the U.S., yet the women’s team has been dominant for decades, always in the debate for the top two or three teams globally. Baseball, softball, hockey, and basketball all have significant pay to play models as well, and the U.S. is highly competitive globally in all of them. All of those sports require just as much skill and training as soccer. The real difference in men’s soccer is that the number of top 1% male athletes in the overall pool is too low. The women’s side gets better talent into the pool because soccer is a top sport in the U.S. among young female athletes, while men’s soccer hasn’t climbed that high yet. The training on the women’s side isn’t better than the men’s side in the U.S. …in fact, many top youth clubs train both boys and girls. The better U.S. men’s soccer can highlight players like Freeman, whose father played NFL football and yet he chose soccer, now making a very nice living overseas, the more top caliber athletes may actually consider putting their heart and soul into a different game than football, basketball or baseball. Once that happens, the U.S. will rise to a top-five team globally fairly easily based on better access to elite athletes in the national player pool.
Maybe they realized after 11 years they have decided to move the girls back into the NISL? Of maybe the non GA teams will play under the Empire banner? https://www.iwsl.com/club.php?clu_code=CQ Empire now has DA and GA Teams for Fall... Holy cow is Sockers tossing in the towel for the non GA Girls? They are still listed in the GA. https://girlsacademyleague.com/members/