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**Guest** · 07-02-2024, 05:11 AM

Youth sports are pretty messy everywhere. One big difference with the US is that our kids play so many different sports, the athletic talent is not stacked into soccer the way it is elsewhere.

**Guest** · 07-02-2024, 05:58 AM

Originally posted by Guest View Post

The youth national teams can’t compete. The senior teams can’t compete. The youth system is doing nothing except for cashing checks and clubs selling “snake oil” disguised as development. Women and girls are no longer marquee.

Wake up US Soccer. Overhaul this fn disaster!

The only true soccer developmenti found here in NJ is with NJ Blaze. FK is one of, if not THE, best soccer trainers there is. Alex.Ramos,.Danny Agame, Ryan Clark at RC Performance, RJ Allen, Mike O'Neil, Dom Bucci, Nick Heinemenn, all of these guys look up to FK and realize he's doing it right. When your the best, people are afraid of you
All these coaches are terrified of FK because he teaches REAL soccer. The country needs more coaches/trainers like him.

**Guest** · 07-02-2024, 06:44 AM

Originally posted by Guest View Post

The youth national teams can’t compete. The senior teams can’t compete. The youth system is doing nothing except for cashing checks and clubs selling “snake oil” disguised as development. Women and girls are no longer marquee.

Wake up US Soccer. Overhaul this fn disaster!

They tried, the paying public didn't want it

**Guest** · 07-02-2024, 08:01 AM

At a professional level it comes sown to coaching

**Guest** · 07-02-2024, 08:44 AM

With teams at this type of level, its always a small margin. USMNT losing 1-0 vs Uruguay is not a crazy result because that is a good team full of quality players. The crime is that Weah got a red card and Berhalter couldnt coach us to a draw vs Panama, despite us having objectively far more talented players on the field, regardless of playing down 1.

**Guest** · 07-02-2024, 08:57 AM

Originally posted by Guest View Post

Youth sports are pretty messy everywhere. One big difference with the US is that our kids play so many different sports, the athletic talent is not stacked into soccer the way it is elsewhere.

So many people lose track of this point. In the US we have several highly paid professional sports (baseball, football, basketball, golf, hockey, etc.) and several of them are much more traditionally "American" than soccer. Growing up just 20 years ago, the only kids that played soccer were the kids that weren't good at basketball, football, or baseball or the kids who had foreign parents. Soccer is still a relatively new sport in the United States and is just now really gaining in popularity, but most of the best male athletes in the country start with american football. I think a big reason why the women's team has been more competitive than the men's is because women don't have the draw to other sports the same way men do, so many of the best US female athletes do play soccer from the start.

**Guest** · 07-02-2024, 09:02 AM

340 million in US vs 3.4 million in Uruguay. Can’t buy that argument. Plenty of top athletes that play soccer. We suck at coaching and teaching the game.

**Guest** · 07-02-2024, 12:20 PM

Originally posted by Guest View Post

340 million in US vs 3.4 million in Uruguay. Can’t buy that argument. Plenty of top athletes that play soccer. We suck at coaching and teaching the game.

It’s 100% coaching. These kids were for the most part developed enough to go to Europe and perform at a young age. It’s not like they don’t look like they belong on the field. So at that point you pretty much know the other teams are better coached.

**Guest** · 07-02-2024, 12:38 PM

Originally posted by Guest View Post

340 million in US vs 3.4 million in Uruguay. Can’t buy that argument. Plenty of top athletes that play soccer. We suck at coaching and teaching the game.

That number is very misleading and has nothing to do with development. The difference is the soccer culture. In Uruguay kids live, breathe and play soccer everyday starting when they can walk. At Christmas they get new cleats, a soccer ball and then go outside and play pick up games after school and the weekends. Same in Costa Rica and countless countries. That’s the difference the soccer culture. Here in the States it’s not even close. Paying 3 days per week with 1.5 hr training sessions with a weekend match is a joke. That is not training it’s an after school activity. That’s who Pulisic’s father took him to Europe at a young age to play regularly. Any kid who wants to succeed must immerse themselves in the soccer culture in Europe and elsewhere.

**Guest** · 07-03-2024, 11:31 PM

Imo the issue is both cultural (most kids don’t understand the game) as well as the youth development systems (pay to play). The argument that our best athletes play other sports is hogwash, we have plenty of soccer athletes in this extremely large population in the US. Just look at the amount of world class players that come from these small euro countries. Us soccer needs an overhaul if they want to seriously compete. Too much money and politics involved, youth clubs need incentive to develop players rather than to win.