The current state of our youth national teams

Here might be a right place to admit that on another hand you never quit on Wright. You win some, you lose some.

 

I don’t personally know if he’s any good. It’s possible they’ve watched him a lot and concluded he’s not any good, but we’ve also had players at big academies called in that weren’t good. I think they probably should give Dettoni a call-up at some point. Let him test himself against the other options, and if then the assessment is that he’s not good enough then no one can say anymore that he wasn’t given a chance.

 

There are millions of US eligible fetuses (feti?) that US Soccer has failed to contact.

 

A slot needs to be held for him in Qatar, and we can only hope he accepts a call up so he can be cap tied. This is crazy! A kid in the U17 at Bayern and we aren’t
contacting him! We need to send him flowers, cards, net messages!!!! We havwe to stroke his ego, What are we doing here!!!!!!

 

Just a dual nat with USA and Italy, I’m not too worried. I’ve seen full matches of Grayson, still a pretty raw player and especially could use some work on the ball but seeing the current CB’s that are being called in for the 05’s I’m surprised that he isn’t one of them

 

It isn’t a scout’s job to do outreach generally unless they’re also in charge of recruitment which they aren’t for ussoccer generally. That job should be done by the coach of that age group who’s job is generally to do the player management and outreach

 

Therein lies the problem. We have no full time U-18 coach or team right now.

 

Lol.

 

Crazy how people learn nothing. Decades and learn nothing,
Stunning.

 

Do we need an under 18 coach though? There hadn't been a fixture since 2018.

Couldn't their responsibilities be handled by our U17, U19 and U20 coaches?

 

We don’t have one, but I think there should be one. Why shouldn’t we have a U-18 team?

 

I don't disagree, necessarily. But, fortunately, the current importance of the youth teams is pretty low.

There was a time when we were heavily reliant on our youth program to replace the entire player pool in a very short time span, but that time seems about over. The youth program still has a major role, but it is nowhere near as crucial as it was over this last decade or so.

Berhalter, US Soccer, and the vast infrastructure from MLS on down all deserve a ton of credit for this all coming to fruition with our youth as it has.

 

It is worth noting that most of the players called into the last U19 came are 05s.

The 06s are the players who will be the bulk of the U17 team.

I don't see a big gap here where an age group is being neglected due to a perceived "lack" of U-18 coach. The 05s, judging by the callups for the last U19 camp, are being evaluated and given opportunities. In addition to those called up for the U19 camp, some of the very best ones have been called up to the U20 camps. Several are on the squad called up by Marko Mitrović for a tournament in Spain next week.

 

I don't know. MLS Next doesn't have a U18 division either.

 

U-18 NT would be 05’s. U-17 division of MLS Next is 05’s.

 

The players that suffer are mostly the 04’s, although a few 05’s also. This can’t be spun positively. Someone suffers from having one less team.

 

Agree.

The main benefit at this point is dual-national recruitment and getting players into the US Soccer pipeline, but gone are the days where competing in these US Youth teams were critical for development and scouting.

They dual-national recruitment piece is important, but the deeper you go to uncover prospects the smaller the return on investment and the expense to run these programs is not insignificant especially for a federation with a scant budget.

 

The number of American citizens living overseas is somewhere between 3x the population of Wales and 3x the population of Uruguay.

We're not going to be able to keep track of every kid who's a bit good at footy.

 

Yes, with all the American expats it must be hard for US Soccer to track obscure, small clubs like, uh, Bayern Munich.