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Acer, as someone in the system, how much do you feel the pay for play model hurts us over all? I know it is changing at the highest levels (MLS academies etc) but maybe not wide spread enough to make a dent in this huge country?
Small fields, tons of touches, practices that focus entirely on technical skill, no official winners or losers or standings until U-11 or U-12 is exactly how my kid's group is set up.
his lack of grit does scare me. It is one of the reasons I wanted him in MLS.
I remember this was a key issue with Zelalem. Supposedly taking up U.S. citizenship could endanger his EU status and then he'd need a work permit to stay at Arsenal.
I dont know about the finance aspect. What I can tell you from being around the HS level is that if clubs want the player enough, and the kid has no money, they will fund him. I also know from having a kid who is just getting into hockey, that I will pay between 2-3k for hockey a year and that is.before he turns 8. Then it goes up. There are thousands of kids that play US youth hockey yet we have never produced a Gretzky.
I was actually looking for a post from then to illustrate how useless a projection is at this juncture. There's probably going to be a handful of guys that will be on the '18 roster that nobody's really heard of right now.
If that was in early 2011, only the most hard core of us knew who Graham Zusi and Matt Besler were and none of us could have projected them as WC material being just subs in MLS.
My knowledge of Norwegian football dates back to the days when Wimbledon had Norwegian owners and management. I doubt a guy like Mix would have flourished in the late 90s golden age of huge Vikings hoofing it up Route One. But the UEFA coefficients don't think too highly of the Norwegian League today. They're ranked below Scotland for God's sakes. I think a move to some place that plays a full length schedule would benefit his game.
Imagine someone in 2010 the day after the Ghana game saying that Wondo would be playing in a knockout game in four years? They'd be straight up laughed at. Hell he was available in the Union's expansion draft in 2010.
A lot of the guys were at least in the mix for whatever reason. Lots of stuff happens. I was ready to slam him for having Fabian Johnson on the radar screen, but not ahead of Lichaj until I remembered that I'm not sure Fab had even played FB by that point. Some of the younger guys in the development cycle might not even be in their best position. A grown up Zelalem might get stronger and be more of a CM than just a CAM.
Holden getting hurt and Landon being flaky and pissing off JK were not predictable.
Seems we take a late developing striker almost every cycle. It would be interesting to try to pinpoint some candidates. Will Bruin?
I think it is pretty high for 2026 all things being equal, although it would be better for everyone if it came here in 2022. Ignoring Oceania, Concacaf has gone by far the longest with out having it.
I'm very pessimistic about 2022. I think it's likely to stay in Qatar but failing that, it will go to Australia.
Not sure if call him late developing but I think Jack Mac is still a factor as a poacher-type upfront.
Doh. And I'm usually one of the guys pimping African football.
So early to tell.
At what level were you taught this? US training might not be, but that doesn't reach all the u8-u10 kids getting poorly trained
I hold a US C license, which targets training players 15-18 since I coached high school for 10 years. I never played high level ball so I was not exempt from the e and d levels which focus on younger players. At every level, the emphasis was the same. I believe that youth training is more of what people are upset with. I coached my daughters U7 team this year. Unfortunately, not every dad or mom who volunteers goes through the education courses even though they should. At my club, you need to have at least gone through or plan to go through the e course which is the basic of basics.
Also wouldn't be surprised to see Wenger get some mentions. I think you'll see these guys get cycle through and pretty much just go with a poacher or two who is having a hot year in the MLS.
If memory serves, Diego played in MLS way back when right?
There you go, Z. No need to go out of house to find that Costa replacement.
Caleb Stanko would likely replace Dejan Stankovic as the player my son most loves having on his FIFA teams, just ahead of Hans-Jorg Butt.
I think the practice v games debate cycles back and forth in the seemingly endless discussion regarding youth soccer training in this country. I recall about 10 years ago reading Claudio Reyna complaining that everything his kids did was too structured, drills, etc., and he just wanted them to play more. I focus more on the cliche that kids only play soccer in this country (whether practice or games) when their parents drive them somewhere. Meaning, there's really very little pick up soccer among kids, similar to the way kids play unorganized basketball and baseball. In Canada, kids play hockey every day year round, in Brazil, ... etc., etc. That can be overstated, but at least in my neck of the woods kids almost never gather at a park to play pick-up soccer on their own, yet they are playing some form of outdoor or indoor soccer several days a week almost year round through their clubs. Somewhat laughably, some of the top youth clubs in our area arrange structured pick-up games - no refs, no scoring, mixed ages and genders, etc. But they are scheduled, coaches and parents are there watching, etc., so in many ways it completely eliminates the perceived benefit of unstructured, pick-up games.
Reyna was on SiriusXM recently talking about this and yeah he does criticize the overly structured practices, but he was mainly talking about practices that are only structured drills and nothing more. Drills have their place imo, but that can't be all you do. In a two hour practice I like to run is: 1-1:15 of drills and then 1:00-:45 of SSG, 3v3 or 4v4 and have winners move from field to field. Zero coaching on my part during these games, it's just letting the kids play and they love it. They always leave practice happy having just played for about an hour freely, with a lot of touches and no coach/parent criticizing them about what they did wrong
He has Mix playing attacking MF and Bradley playing back which makes sense and fits Bradley's style of player better.
Whoscored somehow rated the US pretty highly overall. Timmy Howard had a 10 -- which I have to think isn't very common.Ramsay Hunt Experience said:
