It stops much, much earlier than that with MLS academies. Yes, it would be better if my own local club, NCFC, wasn’t so shitty at developing players. (Compare our metro area to smaller MLS cities and then ponder the zero pros we’ve developed since I think Ike Opara.). But MLS academies have more than enough catchment area for the US to be elite. Over the last 20 years we’ve eliminated pay to play for mid teens and up in MLS cities. We just need to keep expanding that.
I’m not taking the word of a dilettante who doesn’t know how to pronounce Messi’s first name. And then you have Herc Gomez talking about is youth from30 friggin’ years ago. Not at all relevant to today. BWP is the only one worth listening to.
This has been one of my kicks for a while. I know a couple of academies have younger groups — I think Philly goes down to U9 or U8 or something. But I do think a bunch of them start at U12 or U13.
I argue MLS doesn’t have enough catchment. London and Chicago both have around 9 million people living in the city or near it. London has 20-25 professional academies. Chicago has just the one. London has way more youth players. Estimated to have 3 times what we have. So to be on par with what the English are doing we need 6 to 8 academies in Chicago. My guess is most big European cities all have more then one academy - maybe not as many as London. We probably need a minimum of 3-4 in the city the size of Chicago. My area of around 250K should have one academy similar to cities like York and Blackpool. We had one kid that I know of go to Chicago’s system. That is a big commitment to move away or commute back and forth at such a young age. Most families won’t or can’t do this. Good news is my area is getting a MLS next team. In our system kids are getting missed - especially the kids that just live too far from the academy.
Counterpoint: Hasn't hurt England, France, Spain, etc. A strong domestic league is the foundation of their national teams. The floor of the USMNT has never been higher. The quality of players at the backend of the pool has never been higher. The next step is for the second 11 players to actually push to be first 11 players. This notion where ALL of our national team players need to "go to Europe" is an idea from 20 years ago. Look at England. Jude and Harry are England's best players. They play at Real Madrid and Bayern Munich, and the rest play in the EPL. The USMNT needs its VERY best players to play at the best clubs. A stronger, and higher quality MLS helps raise the floor of the National Team. It also creates the environment where the best young players can grow and learn in a great environment. Then the very best of those players move abroad to big clubs. We need the very best players playing week in and week out in Serie A, the EPL, La Liga, Ligue 1 or the Bundesliga. If not those leagues, then they need to be at the top clubs of the other leagues (PSV, Ajax, Porto, Benfica, Celtic, Rangers). How many times have we seen US players come to MLS from Europe's second divisions and just be an average MLS player?
Yeah, if pros in the U.S. had to go to Europe for it to be viable that would just mean the ceiling of domestic soccer is like the current USL and many would be seeking something in Europe like current MLS.
True but they don't have to deal with the MUCH stronger competition the men face. That being said the women's game is getting more competitive too but it will never have the degree & difficulty in competition the men have to deal with.
Isnot that because it was embeddd in high school/college environment and not a P2P system in the first place?
I dunno....... Spain won the World Cup in 2023. The US won it back to back in 2019 and 2015. Kapan won in 2011, Germany won it back to back in 07 and 03. I'd say the US has a lot of competition already. The South American countries are quickly improving, as are the big European Nations (England, France, Spain, etc.).
International competition doesnot play a role. I think the women soccer ecosystem is better at extracting from their pool the best.
The sport is also in a different place than it was 30 years ago... in other countries. Look how much progress Canada has made. You said we were ranked 14-18 in 1996.... how about Canada? My point is... yes, we have improved, but so has the entire world. So our relative standing has not improved. You could say we have regressed a bit, as this is our worst R of 16 loss in recent times. '94 lost by 1 2010 lost by 1 2014 lost by 1 2022 lost by 2 2026 lost by 3 Considering we have a lot of players in Europe and we hired a world-class manager, and this was on home soil... I mean the stars were aligned for us to... at least not lose by 3! Maybe not win, maybe lose by 1... but not lose by 3. (a good amount of that blame is on Tim Ream)
Look at overall performance, too: US Goals scored and goal differential: 1994: 3, -1 1998: 1, -4 2002: 7, 0 2006: 2, -4 2010: 5, 0 2014: 5, -1 2022: 3, -4 2026: 11, +3 The US scored 8 goals in a group stage. The US beat a European team in a knockout game despite a difficult call going against us. Prior to the Belgium game (who knows what the hell happened there?) the US played with confidence and authority. I've never seen a US team do any of these things in the world cup. There's no way this amounts to a regression for the USMNT
Wow. I didn't realize this was our first World Cup with a positive goal differential. That is something.
Not a regression but home field and no contender in the group kind of keeps me from seeing this as anything too special compared to other solid outings.
Upon reflection that should not be a surprise given that 1) its an expanded tournament (ie more lower ranked teams) and 2) as host nation we are automatic 1 seed. I'm guessing this WC created higher GD for many countries vs the past. We were expected to get out of our group. We did better in 1994 relative to expectations. We were not expected to get out of group. In 2026 we are much better and had higher expectations. North america/concacaf really underperformed with no one going past R16 as host nations. Usually host nations do better than their ranking would indicate. South Korea finished 4th in 2002 as hosts. They showed up!
Canada showed up. They exceeded expectations given where that program has been historically. Before this tournament Canada had never earned a point at a world cup before, and the only goal they scored was an own goal. This tourney they scored a bunch of goals, a player had a hat trick, they won a game, finished second in their group, and they won a knockout round game. That's a successful tournament that Canada can build on for the future. The US and Mexico met expectations. There was hope that one of or both nations would reach the quarterfinals, but given the draw bowing out in the round of 16 isn't unexpected.
Let teams spend how they want but also give more protection to get domestic players developed and on the field Open up the pyramid in the usa to allow for true competition and stop protecting mls owners from actual competition Mls teams need to be able to compete in international tournaments like club world cup etc And also get waaaay better international coaches. Epl got way better once they brought in pep klopp poch etc and stopped their obsession with weak English coaches
Did Canada show up? Their squad is just as good as the US/Mexico. I would say deeper than the US as well. They beat a Qatar team that got their first WC point this year and a South Africa team that made it to the round of 32 for the first time themselves. Outside of the Qatar game they scored 3 goals in 4 games.
Oh look, action instead of just talk: With an ongoing national conversation about the price of youth soccer in the U.S. - the KC Current are starting a new league designed with no-cost and no-barriers. The league started on Saturday for 120 8-10-year-olds in KC. @kmbc pic.twitter.com/XKgcFtDSgQ— Eric Graves (@EricGravesKMBC) July 12, 2026
I agree with your assessment. A couple of wrinkles in your ideas. I'm not sure that getting established managers is possible. Part of the allure of the EPL is that it's the top league in the world. Top managers and players want to play at the highest levels. Because the European Cup is a competition for European teams MLS or USL can't use that as a bargaining chip to get the best players to play for a team outside of the top. I believe that MLS teams are already invited to the club wc. So that's done. There is a huge elephant in the room. How do you convince (legally?) the MLS owners to give up their "permanent" seat at the best table? They bought in to an MLS that does not have relegation. Are these owners in this for the betterment of the game, or, is this just an interesting investment? I have an additional change to the US soccer structure that might accelerate youth development. Increase the knowledge that you can be paid compensation through FIFA. Before 2021 MLS and US soccer did not want non-MLS clubs to be aware of this. The more that youth clubs can mitigate pay-to-play expense, the better.