Our team recently attended the Del Sol Phoenix 2011 Winter College Showcase tournament. Games started Friday night and continued until 12 noon Saturday. By then 0.5 inches of rain made the City of Phoenix close down all 17 grass fields at Range 11. Fields remained closed for the rest of Saturday and all of Sunday. Instead of the projected games, teams did penalty kick shootouts. We have been told that Del Sol Soccer and City of Phoenix considered this their contingency plan for field closures. I am curious if Del Sol contacted any of the other local venues or high school turf fields to attempt to relocate games? Our team as well as several others traveling to Phoenix from out of state ended up having 3 PK shootouts. That comprised the tournament. Several other teams were fortunate enough to play 1 game.
Prior to the weekend when inclement weather was predicted by the National Weather Service, Del Sol was contacted to inquire about their contingency plans. No existed but the organizers promised that games would be played. National Weather Service classified the recent weather front as a typical winter storm for the area. Could this lead to field closures? Fields were closed due to bad weather 2 years prior so this is not a novel incident.
Soccer tournaments are about making money. 320 teams attended the Phoenix event, paying $700-900 each. My guess is that Del Sol nets around $100K easily from this event. Plus they saved $ 10K at least since they did not need to pay referees for cancelled games. Del Sol at this point refuses to refund attending teams their fees and compensate them for travel expenses. The cost for an out of state team to fly to Phoenix, rent hotel rooms, cars, foods, etc for players, coaches and some parents can easily be $ 20K. Multiply that by 200 out of area teams and you have $ 4 Million spent.
Can anyone substantiate that Del Sol Soccer Club was not negligent in fulfilling it contractual obligation to provide game venues for the President’s day Soccer Showcase Tournament?
Prior to the weekend when inclement weather was predicted by the National Weather Service, Del Sol was contacted to inquire about their contingency plans. No existed but the organizers promised that games would be played. National Weather Service classified the recent weather front as a typical winter storm for the area. Could this lead to field closures? Fields were closed due to bad weather 2 years prior so this is not a novel incident.
Soccer tournaments are about making money. 320 teams attended the Phoenix event, paying $700-900 each. My guess is that Del Sol nets around $100K easily from this event. Plus they saved $ 10K at least since they did not need to pay referees for cancelled games. Del Sol at this point refuses to refund attending teams their fees and compensate them for travel expenses. The cost for an out of state team to fly to Phoenix, rent hotel rooms, cars, foods, etc for players, coaches and some parents can easily be $ 20K. Multiply that by 200 out of area teams and you have $ 4 Million spent.
Can anyone substantiate that Del Sol Soccer Club was not negligent in fulfilling it contractual obligation to provide game venues for the President’s day Soccer Showcase Tournament?