Youth Soccer Burnout

[Guest]

All these tryouts for kids but do coaches even get evaluated? I thought coaches had to have some certification but I hear from friends that some coaches do not and then require boys to come to practice three or more times a week. I am talking about boys ECNL teams U 13 and U 14.

Coaches are (supposed to be) evaluated by the club and the USSF licensing system is pretty extensive. When my son played ECNL a few years ago there were no official licensing requirements (it may have changed) but individual clubs might. The coaches at most clubs that have ECNL will likely have at least a C and be working toward or already have an A or B. The process takes time, though, and is expensive so if they're younger, expect them to have a lower level.

There was a time when I too would complain of the expense in DA/ECNL/MLS NEXT. Then I met a few families on a different path. Take a look at Overtime Elite Academt, IMG, Ross Tennis school, Burke school, etc. these elite schools and elite leagues exist because parents are willing to pay.

Now in my opinion ECNL is not the greatest structure, but it allows for a varied level of competition across the country, and one year playoffs are held on the West Coast followed by a year on the East coast. There was some solid soccer played in California and the way it was structured allowed for some downtime between games. Certainly not designed for everyone, but neither is an $80k per year sports focused high school. I suppose we all reserve the right to say no and pull our kids out if the costs to participate did not work for us.

Requiring kids to come to practice often is a good sign, though. It means the coach is dedicated, which is important at that age.

[Guest]

Coaches are (supposed to be) evaluated by the club and the USSF licensing system is pretty extensive. When my son played ECNL a few years ago there were no official licensing requirements (it may have changed) but individual clubs might. The coaches at most clubs that have ECNL will likely have at least a C and be working toward or already have an A or B. The process takes time, though, and is expensive so if they're younger, expect them to have a lower level.

There was a time when I too would complain of the expense in DA/ECNL/MLS NEXT. Then I met a few families on a different path. Take a look at Overtime Elite Academt, IMG, Ross Tennis school, Burke school, etc. these elite schools and elite leagues exist because parents are willing to pay.

Now in my opinion ECNL is not the greatest structure, but it allows for a varied level of competition across the country, and one year playoffs are held on the West Coast followed by a year on the East coast. There was some solid soccer played in California and the way it was structured allowed for some downtime between games. Certainly not designed for everyone, but neither is an $80k per year sports focused high school. I suppose we all reserve the right to say no and pull our kids out if the costs to participate did not work for us.

Requiring kids to come to practice often is a good sign, though. It means the coach is dedicated, which is important at that age.

Sure you could. But during the regular season you wouldn’t have trips to Alabama to Florida or the Carolinas. Hey, I’m just starting to get into all this so I don’t know a lot more than I do but when it’s my turn to become benevolent dictator I’d establish a greater metro league. The rest of the state could partner up with closest neighboring states if they have good enough teams. You can keep your regionals and nationals. I just don’t see how parents with two kids in the system do it on a week to week basis. Clubs don’t evaluate their coaches the way they should. Most of these coaches played soccer but have no idea how to properly treat developing children/athletes. Having a C license running an EXPENSIVE high level team is a joke! ECNL/RL/GA etc. cost parents thousands every year, having a competent coach is not a lot to ask for. The quality of coaching will not get any better until we parents speak out against the bad ones & demand higher quality from the clubs that cash our checks $$$

[Guest]

First, ECNL is way too expensive to settle for a coach that is not even certified. There is definitely a lack of coaches/qualified coaches but if a club is ok taking shortcuts & charging NL money for someone who is not qualified I would move on. Speaks a lot to the culture of the club & what they are willing to do. Some clubs are recruiting international coaches for their high level programs. These international coaches are coming over with higher level license & more years of experience. I have been really impressed from seeing some of these international coaches. Seems like a good fix to a current US problem.

Second, international doesn't mean better. I've seen plenty of coaches from "football playing countries" that have no business being near a pitch, let alone coaching kids. Evaluate all coaches on thier individual merits. Always have your kid train multiple times with a new coach/team before you commit. I understand why the tryout windows have been established, but it's made "coach tryouts" almost impossible unless you're willing to change platforms, an option that is basically non-existent for north shore youngers, unless parents refuse to play by club timelines.

Third, U11/U12 big clubs go to small clubs for players or maybe flip a big club player. At U15/U16 big clubs watch what happens in high school to identify players. This is because "over-generalizing" all the top kids at U13 are big kids, tall kids, usually all talented, but usually not late bloomers. So if your kid makes a top team at U13, congrats. They were early bloomers. Probably a Jan-Mar birthday. Yeah there are exceptions we are talking about typically.

Fourth, the U15/U16 coaches have teams set, and since very few clubs have real ID sessions or actual tryouts (instead just random connections/scouting), they do not take new kids since the new kids are generally around the same level as who they got, maybe slightly better). Then coaches watch high school and say, well where did that kid come from? Let me add him to the ECNL team. That was the same kid btw they wouldn't consider at their tryouts/scouting that had played at their club on 2nd or 3rd team for the last four years (also, not my kid but saw personally four instances of this in the past two years).

Fifth, the biggest problem to me is not MLSNext or ECNL; it is that ENCL-R takes so many second teams out of SCCL. Or, if they were going to have it they are so exclusive and prevent smaller clubs from entering it, it keeps good teams from staying together to keep the monopoly going. So, it doesn't get better for some of the ladies in college and even the Pros with low level coaches. Basically, girls have been treated like **** for thousands of years and soccer has been a place where many women have been treated bad from coaches that are clueless. I still remember one young male coach with accent telling one of his 11-year-old female players who was crying, "stop crying all the time. Are you on your period again." It was insane. Dude had no kids and was just a single man that was good looking coach, had charm and wit, excellent salesman and the accent to boot. He also played the great game in Europe and knew the game, so it seemed like a home run. However, his communication with the parents and kids was horrible at best and illegal at worse. He ended up getting fired and last I hear he's in corporate sales.

[Guest]

First, ECNL is way too expensive to settle for a coach that is not even certified. There is definitely a lack of coaches/qualified coaches but if a club is ok taking shortcuts & charging NL money for someone who is not qualified I would move on. Speaks a lot to the culture of the club & what they are willing to do. Some clubs are recruiting international coaches for their high level programs. These international coaches are coming over with higher level license & more years of experience. I have been really impressed from seeing some of these international coaches. Seems like a good fix to a current US problem.

Second, international doesn't mean better. I've seen plenty of coaches from "football playing countries" that have no business being near a pitch, let alone coaching kids. Evaluate all coaches on thier individual merits. Always have your kid train multiple times with a new coach/team before you commit. I understand why the tryout windows have been established, but it's made "coach tryouts" almost impossible unless you're willing to change platforms, an option that is basically non-existent for north shore youngers, unless parents refuse to play by club timelines.

Third, U11/U12 big clubs go to small clubs for players or maybe flip a big club player. At U15/U16 big clubs watch what happens in high school to identify players. This is because "over-generalizing" all the top kids at U13 are big kids, tall kids, usually all talented, but usually not late bloomers. So if your kid makes a top team at U13, congrats. They were early bloomers. Probably a Jan-Mar birthday. Yeah there are exceptions we are talking about typically.

Fourth, the U15/U16 coaches have teams set, and since very few clubs have real ID sessions or actual tryouts (instead just random connections/scouting), they do not take new kids since the new kids are generally around the same level as who they got, maybe slightly better). Then coaches watch high school and say, well where did that kid come from? Let me add him to the ECNL team. That was the same kid btw they wouldn't consider at their tryouts/scouting that had played at their club on 2nd or 3rd team for the last four years (also, not my kid but saw personally four instances of this in the past two years).

Fifth, the biggest problem to me is not MLSNext or ECNL; it is that ENCL-R takes so many second teams out of SCCL. Or, if they were going to have it they are so exclusive and prevent smaller clubs from entering it, it keeps good teams from staying together to keep the monopoly going. So, it doesn't get better for some of the ladies in college and even the Pros with low level coaches. Basically, girls have been treated like **** for thousands of years and soccer has been a place where many women have been treated bad from coaches that are clueless. I still remember one young male coach with accent telling one of his 11-year-old female players who was crying, "stop crying all the time. Are you on your period again." It was insane. Dude had no kids and was just a single man that was good looking coach, had charm and wit, excellent salesman and the accent to boot. He also played the great game in Europe and knew the game, so it seemed like a home run. However, his communication with the parents and kids was horrible at best and illegal at worse. He ended up getting fired and last I hear he's in corporate sales.

Your thoughts are as lame as an AT&T television commercial. Utter horse dung! Have you been using prevagen?

[Guest]

Your thoughts are as lame as an AT&T television commercial. Utter horse dung! Have you been using prevagen?

Completely agree. And these are kids. This isn't MLS/USNWT/USNMT or even college level. The clubs, coaches, and especially the DOC's and those higher up in the "chain of command" couldn't care less about the development. It's all about the Benjamins and politics.

[Guest]

It's simple, don't join club if you don't like it. Who cares what others are doing.

[Guest]

It's simple, don't join club if you don't like it. Who cares what others are doing.

Is it that simple? Would be curious around the details. I haven't seen it given as an actual red card, but have definitely seen some parents kicked off the sidelines in my day. In a fairly meaningless tournament/showcase game last spring (older ages, only spring event we played after the high school season, not the highest level of competition or anything), the opposing team in one game had 2 separate parents get booted off the sidelines for riding the refs way too much, including one cussing. And then, right after the final whistle blew, another parent jumped up and cussed at the refs (yelled, "Glad the game's over so I can tell you what a sh**ty job you did!"), at which point the ref called him & the coach over to say he wasn't allowed back the rest of the weekend. The players were the ones most embarrassed about the whole deal, as you might imagine. It was very classless, and I'm just glad it was the opposing parents, not ours!

[Guest]

Is it that simple? Would be curious around the details. I haven't seen it given as an actual red card, but have definitely seen some parents kicked off the sidelines in my day. In a fairly meaningless tournament/showcase game last spring (older ages, only spring event we played after the high school season, not the highest level of competition or anything), the opposing team in one game had 2 separate parents get booted off the sidelines for riding the refs way too much, including one cussing. And then, right after the final whistle blew, another parent jumped up and cussed at the refs (yelled, "Glad the game's over so I can tell you what a sh**ty job you did!"), at which point the ref called him & the coach over to say he wasn't allowed back the rest of the weekend. The players were the ones most embarrassed about the whole deal, as you might imagine. It was very classless, and I'm just glad it was the opposing parents, not ours!

Nothing in that simple. No. Join or die really.

The short version is that it was a mess and cops were almost called. The longer version is below.

The ref had not been making many calls the first 20 minutes. He didn’t stop the game for headers (this was an Academy game) and he missed some obvious fouls by both teams. At some point, an opposing player pushed a player on my kid’s team over and then scored about two seconds later. One of the parents started making comments to the ref and then stood up and screamed several obscenities. The ref warned the parent several times and said, “I’m about to throw you out.” Unfortunately, the parent kept yelling. Red card came after that. The parent then walked to the parking lot and continued to cause a scene once the game continued. Some adults from the opposing team tried to calm the parent down but it only made the situation worse. Things finally got better at halftime when it was clear cops were about to be called. The icing on the cake was that my kid’s coach was also yelling at the ref after the foul and threw something in their anger that almost hit one of the players. Set a great example for the kids.

[Guest]

Nothing in that simple. No. Join or die really.

The short version is that it was a mess and cops were almost called. The longer version is below.

The ref had not been making many calls the first 20 minutes. He didn’t stop the game for headers (this was an Academy game) and he missed some obvious fouls by both teams. At some point, an opposing player pushed a player on my kid’s team over and then scored about two seconds later. One of the parents started making comments to the ref and then stood up and screamed several obscenities. The ref warned the parent several times and said, “I’m about to throw you out.” Unfortunately, the parent kept yelling. Red card came after that. The parent then walked to the parking lot and continued to cause a scene once the game continued. Some adults from the opposing team tried to calm the parent down but it only made the situation worse. Things finally got better at halftime when it was clear cops were about to be called. The icing on the cake was that my kid’s coach was also yelling at the ref after the foul and threw something in their anger that almost hit one of the players. Set a great example for the kids.

I’d love to know which club it is and who the coach is. They should be named so that others know to avoid that coach. While not necessarily “unethical”, it’s just a shizatty thing to do. You should’ve asked that coach - “So you’ve never gone on an interview while you had a job? And you’re never leaving this job unless they fire you?” He would have been stumbling over his words.

[Guest]

6 year olds? Wow, things are out of control these days. No one will remember “academies” at that age. Just focus on your child developing a passion for the sport and acquiring the basic skills.

You ask what the point of those leagues isn't to grow the game. The point is for the administrators to get paid. It's just AAU Soccer.

Breaking into those urban areas is going to mean taking a massive financial loss early on. Something that the powers that be, are not willing to pay for. Even the European academies aren't money makers themselves.

You also need to have some kind of draw. You can't just set up an indoor or outdoor league. You need to give kids a reason to leave the football/basketball/baseball league they're currently playing in.

Nobody at US Soccer, or anywhere for that matter, has cracked the code for getting young black kids to stop playing basketball and start playing soccer.

That even ignores the moral issue, of doing what the academies do, pulling kids out of regular schooling, giving them a subpar education and having them focus on soccer, even knowing that 70% of the 12 year olds whose future you just irreparably damaged, will never see a dime of it.

Aw man! I’m so sorry to hear. About 3 years ago when I was 19 years old, I had a similar experience. I didn’t have a melt down but the players and parents were really disrespectful and abusive. I was AR in that game and it was my first year being referee so I didn’t have any experience and missed some obvious calls. I got to my car and felt like I just wanted to “disappear.” It sucks! I thought about it the rest of day and the next morning. So, I decided that I needed to let off some steam and hit the gym. As a side note, it was one of my best workout I ever had. All my frustration went to that.

I ended up taking a month break from refereeing. I took that time to read and reread the MIAA rules. Got enough courage to work 3 games for a tournament and felt really happy. It also made me realize that you need to have a “thick skin” when you go through that abusive experience. Don’t take ANY sort of disrespect and abusive behavior from players, coaches, and parents. Also, don’t forget to be profesional about it. Tell the parents to leave the field (wait to start the game until they get to their car) and caution or red card the players and/or coaches. If you can, give them a stern explanation why this sort of behavior is not tolerated. Take zero crap from anyone while at the same time being professional about.

The best way I can encourage you is that you use the incident as part of your experience. Reflect what happened and see how you can change it for the next time you are out on the field. Talk to the referees when you show up to the field and pick their brains about it. You will only get better from this and it will boast your confidence. In my second year, that’s what I did. Now that I’m 22 years old, I have a calm temper but I have no tolerance for abuse. I address it immediately and the behavior normally stops. I did have to kick some parents out because they wouldn’t stop. I have faith you will grow from this experience.

[Guest]

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[Guest]

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What rock did you crawl out from under?

[Guest]

Sure you could. But during the regular season you wouldn’t have trips to Alabama to Florida or the Carolinas. Hey, I’m just starting to get into all this so I don’t know a lot more than I do but when it’s my turn to become benevolent dictator I’d establish a greater metro league. The rest of the state could partner up with closest neighboring states if they have good enough teams. You can keep your regionals and nationals. I just don’t see how parents with two kids in the system do it on a week to week basis. Clubs don’t evaluate their coaches the way they should. Most of these coaches played soccer but have no idea how to properly treat developing children/athletes. Having a C license running an EXPENSIVE high level team is a joke! ECNL/RL/GA etc. cost parents thousands every year, having a competent coach is not a lot to ask for. The quality of coaching will not get any better until we parents speak out against the bad ones & demand higher quality from the clubs that cash our checks $$$

RAYGUN
https://olympics.com/OG2024/assets/images/flags/OG2024/AUS.webp
Australia
Breaking
Date of Birth: 2 Sep 1987
Age: 37
Gender: Female
Function: Athlete
Birth Country: Australia
Place of residence : SYDNEY, NSW
Residence Country: Australia

[Guest]

RAYGUN
Australia
Breaking
Date of Birth: 2 Sep 1987
Age: 37
Gender: Female
Function: Athlete
Birth Country: Australia
Place of residence : SYDNEY, NSW
Residence Country: Australia

Hard to find certifiable coaches, and if you find them, clubs need to pay to train them as the courses are so expensive. That cost bleeds down to the families. I have coached my kid, but I made sure to receive proper training in order to help him and his teammates the best I could. But it ain't cheap and takes a while. The USSF D license, for example, is 32 hours of on field instruction and 20 hours of classroom instruction.

[Guest]

6 years old? Insane. Don't sweat these crazy parents. At that age, should probably be playing multiple sports anyway, to develop a more well-rounded physique. That's what all the experts say.

Try to relax and revisit the rat race in a few years. If anything, paying for the 'academy' is not necessary at that age and most kids will fall away. Unless you enjoy burning money.

roflmao on a serious note its common out here. Some parents ive seen have volunteered to stay next to the $$ to keep some semblance of power for their ds/dd. Kid started who had no real legitimate reason to start other than their parents knowing the clubs dirty financial laundry