Initial thoughts on Fall SuperLiga?

[Unregistered]

Does anybody have any initial thoughts on the first week of Fall SuperLiga?

How were the parents or coaches behaved?

Were there any games that were out of hand early and due to the goal differential policy, the winning team was forced to play keep away for an extended period of time?

Are there teams that are clearly in the wrong division?

[Unregistered]

Does anybody have any initial thoughts on the first week of Fall SuperLiga?

How were the parents or coaches behaved?

Were there any games that were out of hand early and due to the goal differential policy, the winning team was forced to play keep away for an extended period of time?

Are there teams that are clearly in the wrong division?

Other than the usual Bristol coaches whining about the referees?

[Unregistered]

Other than the usual Bristol coaches whining about the referees?

Lol. Are they still doing that?

[Unregistered]

Lol. Are they still doing that?

I love the Fall SuperLiga. It's a great opportunity for committed spring baseball, lacrosse and softball kids to play competitive soccer on a state level. It gets more kids playing the game.

[Unregistered]

There are problems with clubs sandbagging. Besides the fact there should be more competition in terms of "leagues" and the guy involved with SuperLiga sits on the SRI board, there should be greater accountability in terms of how clubs have done.

For example, if you went over .500 in Classic, made it to RI Cup semi-finals you have to put a team in Anchor the following year. If you went over .500 in Rhody, you can not put a team in Rhody for the same age group the next year. Need more of the MAPLE like relegation..or at least some end of season review on clubs. Do more roster audits -- a second year team can't compete in Rhody, etc. yes, there's the coaches meeting where coaches can say something..but this is really where SRI needs to manage things..if you dominate classic-gold but didn't field an anchor team, you will be forced next year to play anchor..if that team gets killed, then hopefully clubs will learn to put teams in the right category..

Since Fall is off-season and technically a "tournament", then I get it's going to be harder to place teams..but, if you have at mid-season a team always getting up 6 goals..and a team that is getting killed every game, build in some flexibility. I'm paying $$ for my kid to get better.he doesn't get that playing keep away for 30 minutes (which is embarrassing to the losing side) or having a clearly older, more skilled team do that to his team..be creative. have a mercy rule that if a teams gets up by 8 goals, you stop..game is over..now take the rest of the game and mix the teams up and just scrimmage.

SRI and SuperLiga need a serious discussion on how to handle lopsided games. It starts with holding clubs accountable for sandbagging or fielding teams that have no business in travel and should be in rec. I agree on capping the goal differential..but telling kids to stop scoring (especially the weaker players who now get a chance to score) is counterproductive to kids "building a love for the game." Read Landon Donovan's interview..he scored 7 goals his first game and got the fever..today, we would pull the kid after 3 goals and tell him to play nice and don't shoot anymore..nobody wants 20-0 games either so at the younger ages, throw the rule book out. Game over at 6-0..now we let team X play with 2 people up..or better yet, team Y plays a person or two down..really force those kids to play without changing the way we want the kids to play..We fine coaches of skilled teams..we should fine clubs that either sandbag or field teams that put kids in the wrong level..remember, it's about them, right?

It kills me when Region 1 lists 8-0 game at ODP as "unsportsmanlike"..no, the problem is the state association that fielded such a crappy ODP team..I didn't see Portugal stop scoring when they were up 6 goals in the World Cup..

Then again, more accountability may mean you actually tell some clubs that can't field a team..those players are better off in rec learning skills..oops, but more teams = more money and the SRI Board has a conflict of interest in having a guy who makes money from the league being part of the decision-making that governs the league..

[Unregistered]

There are problems with clubs sandbagging. Besides the fact there should be more competition in terms of "leagues" and the guy involved with SuperLiga sits on the SRI board, there should be greater accountability in terms of how clubs have done.

For example, if you went over .500 in Classic, made it to RI Cup semi-finals you have to put a team in Anchor the following year. If you went over .500 in Rhody, you can not put a team in Rhody for the same age group the next year. Need more of the MAPLE like relegation..or at least some end of season review on clubs. Do more roster audits -- a second year team can't compete in Rhody, etc. yes, there's the coaches meeting where coaches can say something..but this is really where SRI needs to manage things..if you dominate classic-gold but didn't field an anchor team, you will be forced next year to play anchor..if that team gets killed, then hopefully clubs will learn to put teams in the right category..

Since Fall is off-season and technically a "tournament", then I get it's going to be harder to place teams..but, if you have at mid-season a team always getting up 6 goals..and a team that is getting killed every game, build in some flexibility. I'm paying $$ for my kid to get better.he doesn't get that playing keep away for 30 minutes (which is embarrassing to the losing side) or having a clearly older, more skilled team do that to his team..be creative. have a mercy rule that if a teams gets up by 8 goals, you stop..game is over..now take the rest of the game and mix the teams up and just scrimmage.

SRI and SuperLiga need a serious discussion on how to handle lopsided games. It starts with holding clubs accountable for sandbagging or fielding teams that have no business in travel and should be in rec. I agree on capping the goal differential..but telling kids to stop scoring (especially the weaker players who now get a chance to score) is counterproductive to kids "building a love for the game." Read Landon Donovan's interview..he scored 7 goals his first game and got the fever..today, we would pull the kid after 3 goals and tell him to play nice and don't shoot anymore..nobody wants 20-0 games either so at the younger ages, throw the rule book out. Game over at 6-0..now we let team X play with 2 people up..or better yet, team Y plays a person or two down..really force those kids to play without changing the way we want the kids to play..We fine coaches of skilled teams..we should fine clubs that either sandbag or field teams that put kids in the wrong level..remember, it's about them, right?

It kills me when Region 1 lists 8-0 game at ODP as "unsportsmanlike"..no, the problem is the state association that fielded such a crappy ODP team..I didn't see Portugal stop scoring when they were up 6 goals in the World Cup..

Then again, more accountability may mean you actually tell some clubs that can't field a team..those players are better off in rec learning skills..oops, but more teams = more money and the SRI Board has a conflict of interest in having a guy who makes money from the league being part of the decision-making that governs the league..

To be fair to SuperLiga regarding blowouts, when I coached in SuperLiga, the coaches were told at the coaches meeting not to let the score of a game get beyond 6-0. We were told to play short-handed and not shoot.

Listen, is this a perfect solution? No. But it's reasonable. My team had to play short-handed on a couple of occasins and it didn't kill anyone. Sure, it wasn't as fun as a competitive game, but we only had to play short-handed for the last 10-15 minutes of the game. I explained why we were doing it to the kids and they understood.

As far as team placement goes, I think Oscar does a pretty good job of getting the teams in the right divisions. Really, in my experience, very few coaches want to romp to an undefeated record in Classic when they could be competitive in Anchor. My biggest regret when I coached U12 was not putting my team in Anchor. I didn't really know what to expect as we were a new team. But, out of an 8 game season, we really only played 3-4 competitive games. Blowouts benefit no one. If I could do it all over again, we would have played in Anchor.

I agree with you regarding leagues - if someone wants to start up a new league I don't think they should have to go before the SRI Board and have it voted on. Just start the thing up and have at it. The market will dictate how many leagues are necessary, just like the market will dictate how many clubs are necessary.

JB

[Unregistered]

SuperLiga still says the same thing at 6-0, but the coach now gets fined if the score is greater than 6 goals. Actually, adding players (no, that violates the Laws of the Game - illegal substitution) or removing players (technically a violation too) is not allowed. The guidance is simply don't score -- again, read the discussion on the USYSA board about why the US National team can't produce goal scorers similar to peer nations. Kids love to play soccer mainly because they can play with their friends, touch the ball, and score (or try to score).

I'm suspect Oscar/SL do the best they can given the amount of teams, but the default answer should be like in baseball. If team A gets up by more than 6 goals, then the mercy rule kicks in. The game score is locked. Now, remove 1 player (U12) or 2 players (U14 and up) until score is back within 4. I realize this reduces playing time for the better team (not desirable either), but the remaining players will actually continue to play the game, not engage in some variant called keepaway or no shoot. Can you imagine if baseball had a rule where the batter is told swing and miss..or just stand there with the bat on your shoulder? Or if basketball didn't have a shot clock and the best player just dribbled around or the tallest player held the ball over his head the rest of the game?

I do think SL could pay more attention to the classic level. Rhody should be limited to clubs with no spring rec. If you have spring rec, you shouldn't field a team unless your rec league can't field enough teams (which argues for perhaps more cross-club play at the rec level instead of defaulting to travel). For RI Cup, the only group that should be allowed to compete is anchor level (A level) of the various leagues (currently only one!). It's fine if SL wants to have a champion in all four divisions, but SRI should only play have its cup for the anchor level.

And while I don't have the data to support either way, I would question how many clubs but second year teams in classic blue. There should be a rule that if your team has more than 40% 2d year players in an age group (U12 and up), then you can only enter gold or anchor.

I agree with you on leagues. All a league should have to do is submit league rules for compliance with USYSA policies (i.e. non-competitive at U10, etc.) and let the market decide. SRI should be promoting more cooperation between clubs on the development side.

[Unregistered]

Interesting thoughts without disparaging comments...great thread. For every team that is "sandbagging", there are other teams that clearly have no business in the division that they are in. I have coached in SuperLiga ("Classic" and "Gold") on the boys side with varying degrees of success. A couple of ideas for SuperLiga:
1. Our town is relatively small. We do well to field a team in the majority of the divisions. However, we have some very talented "premier" players in our town. If there were some flexibility for SuperLiga to schedule games on Sat. at the U12 level, then more towns could field "Anchor" teams with up to 3 premier players since premier games are played on Sundays.

2. I don't agree with a goal differential policy per se, but I sincerely disagree with it at the "Anchor" level. If you don't belong in "Anchor", don't play there. It is the highest division, and a team that is dominating in that division, shouldn't have to play a few players down or be forced to manage the game such that they only score 3 goals in the 1st half in order to keep the game interesting in the 2nd half. That rule should not apply in the "Anchor" division.

3. Get rid of some of the coaching license B.S. Some of the best coaches that I have seen in our town don't have the time to take a 20 hour "E" course, or everytime, they try to take a 36 hour "D" course it is cancelled, or more appalling is the need for their courses, when HS coaches have already been certified, but yet SuperLiga makes them take a Youth Module. This is nothing more than an attempt by SRI to impose their "ideas" and make a few bucks for the people they consider to be the "teachers" of such courses.

[Unregistered]

Interesting thoughts without disparaging comments...great thread. For every team that is "sandbagging", there are other teams that clearly have no business in the division that they are in. I have coached in SuperLiga ("Classic" and "Gold") on the boys side with varying degrees of success. A couple of ideas for SuperLiga:
1. Our town is relatively small. We do well to field a team in the majority of the divisions. However, we have some very talented "premier" players in our town. If there were some flexibility for SuperLiga to schedule games on Sat. at the U12 level, then more towns could field "Anchor" teams with up to 3 premier players since premier games are played on Sundays.

2. I don't agree with a goal differential policy per se, but I sincerely disagree with it at the "Anchor" level. If you don't belong in "Anchor", don't play there. It is the highest division, and a team that is dominating in that division, shouldn't have to play a few players down or be forced to manage the game such that they only score 3 goals in the 1st half in order to keep the game interesting in the 2nd half. That rule should not apply in the "Anchor" division.

3. Get rid of some of the coaching license B.S. Some of the best coaches that I have seen in our town don't have the time to take a 20 hour "E" course, or everytime, they try to take a 36 hour "D" course it is cancelled, or more appalling is the need for their courses, when HS coaches have already been certified, but yet SuperLiga makes them take a Youth Module. This is nothing more than an attempt by SRI to impose their "ideas" and make a few bucks for the people they consider to be the "teachers" of such courses.

Great post.

I think the reason Fall SuperLiga plays predominantly on Sundays is because of conflicts with Saturday rec leagues. Very understandable. But I agree with your idea of getting more of the premier kids to play for their town teams, too. Much more common in Mass, btw.

100% agree on what you say about goal differential policy for Anchor. At some point we have to cut apron strings.

SRI's coaching license requirements are over the top. Having to take such long courses does more to scare people away from coaching than anything else. Personally, I think it's more about trying to limit the number of E and D licensed coaches in the state so "professional" coaches are more in demand.

In contrast, the state needs referees, right? So, they make it relatively easy. To become a grade 8 ref requires only 10 hours of coursework. With grade 8 certification, you can do HS games. You would think that a referee's course would be MORE hours than a coaching course, right?

JB

[Unregistered]

Great post.

I think the reason Fall SuperLiga plays predominantly on Sundays is because of conflicts with Saturday rec leagues. Very understandable. But I agree with your idea of getting more of the premier kids to play for their town teams, too. Much more common in Mass, btw.

100% agree on what you say about goal differential policy for Anchor. At some point we have to cut apron strings.

SRI's coaching license requirements are over the top. Having to take such long courses does more to scare people away from coaching than anything else. Personally, I think it's more about trying to limit the number of E and D licensed coaches in the state so "professional" coaches are more in demand.

In contrast, the state needs referees, right? So, they make it relatively easy. To become a grade 8 ref requires only 10 hours of coursework. With grade 8 certification, you can do HS games. You would think that a referee's course would be MORE hours than a coaching course, right?

JB

The Premier Club practices and game schedules typically would not allow a kid to play both. And typically you MS and HS teams will have many of the Premier kids busy in the fall.

[Unregistered]

Interesting though on anchor..I agree with that sentiment - hence my point RI Cup should only be anchor.

I suppose moving boys' anchor games to Saturdays would help with dual rostering - however, it's still a lot of soccer at the younger age, not to mention the conflicts with which team's practices prevail (premier usually by commitment contract) and a player can only be on one roster for State Cup. Also, if the better kids are only showing up for games, then the rest of the team is not benefiting from their presence at training. Better to eliminate the town rule and allow the more "on the ball" local clubs to offer some real value competition with premier clubs.

Of course, I would also eliminate U8 travel leagues and rethink U10 (it's non-competitive after all, right?). Mia Hamm's comments that she played way less "organized" soccer than today's girls, but a lot more pickup/"unorganized" soccer is telling. SRI needs to promote more developmental opportunities and less emphasis on putting young kids (2d graders!) into rule-laden travel leagues.

This was a problem I had with USYSA's recent vision document. The vision starts by saying “don’t apply the professional model of success to youth sports”; however, we mimic the professional model (leagues/division/teams) in creating the youth model.

If you are measuring success in a flawed model, then how can you expect change? An example – If USYS were really serious about taking out ‘winning’ and implementing ‘developing’, then go beyond just the “non-results” oriented guidance in a system based on individual team outcomes. Instead of the “team” concept at young ages, promote forming cohorts of players. Train together in cohorts. For in-house and external league competition, schedule cohorts to meet, but scramble the players (yes, even the players from different clubs) for the match..even rescramble at halftime. You can keep score, but since teams change continually, there is no “my team loses every game.” (I can hear the groans of administrators). Tournaments at a younger age become where the club picks similar ability kids to participate and then they go back to their different cohorts. Instead, we are slaves to rosters and teams and thus forced to come up with all kinds of rules upon rules to treat the symptoms, not the problem.

I guess I disagree on the coaching requirement. However, I would say that there is no reason the youth modules can't be put on-line (video lectures) with an on-line test (or print, scan, send). You can add a lot more content (like how kids learn skills, video examples of "bad" coaching, video examples of good coaching, etc..). Why doesn't SRI have a you-tube channel or on-line video library? You could also condense the E to part on-line (prerequisite you take at your own pace and when you reach X, you can submit for the "residential" part -- that should be done in one day. No offense to my E instructors (who I like), but a lot of time hearing them talk that was aimed at the "lowest common denominator" coach..Residential time should be on the field/experiential learning mostly.

Refs -- that could be a whole thread. I think SRI is doing a better job at making developmental opportunities available. But a ref can screw up 1 game..a bad coach can screw up kids for a lot longer.. Some clubs seem to treat refs as personal fiefdom..reward some kids, etc. The issues to me are more with lack of supervision once trained, lack of feedback mechanism (real constructive feedback, not whining) for coaches on refs (game report is not the answer -- need on-line website), and lack of control by club on parents who hound young kids from the sidelines..

-COL

[Unregistered]

Interesting though on anchor..I agree with that sentiment - hence my point RI Cup should only be anchor.

I suppose moving boys' anchor games to Saturdays would help with dual rostering - however, it's still a lot of soccer at the younger age, not to mention the conflicts with which team's practices prevail (premier usually by commitment contract) and a player can only be on one roster for State Cup. Also, if the better kids are only showing up for games, then the rest of the team is not benefiting from their presence at training. Better to eliminate the town rule and allow the more "on the ball" local clubs to offer some real value competition with premier clubs.

Of course, I would also eliminate U8 travel leagues and rethink U10 (it's non-competitive after all, right?). Mia Hamm's comments that she played way less "organized" soccer than today's girls, but a lot more pickup/"unorganized" soccer is telling. SRI needs to promote more developmental opportunities and less emphasis on putting young kids (2d graders!) into rule-laden travel leagues.

This was a problem I had with USYSA's recent vision document. The vision starts by saying “don’t apply the professional model of success to youth sports”; however, we mimic the professional model (leagues/division/teams) in creating the youth model.

If you are measuring success in a flawed model, then how can you expect change? An example – If USYS were really serious about taking out ‘winning’ and implementing ‘developing’, then go beyond just the “non-results” oriented guidance in a system based on individual team outcomes. Instead of the “team” concept at young ages, promote forming cohorts of players. Train together in cohorts. For in-house and external league competition, schedule cohorts to meet, but scramble the players (yes, even the players from different clubs) for the match..even rescramble at halftime. You can keep score, but since teams change continually, there is no “my team loses every game.” (I can hear the groans of administrators). Tournaments at a younger age become where the club picks similar ability kids to participate and then they go back to their different cohorts. Instead, we are slaves to rosters and teams and thus forced to come up with all kinds of rules upon rules to treat the symptoms, not the problem.

I guess I disagree on the coaching requirement. However, I would say that there is no reason the youth modules can't be put on-line (video lectures) with an on-line test (or print, scan, send). You can add a lot more content (like how kids learn skills, video examples of "bad" coaching, video examples of good coaching, etc..). Why doesn't SRI have a you-tube channel or on-line video library? You could also condense the E to part on-line (prerequisite you take at your own pace and when you reach X, you can submit for the "residential" part -- that should be done in one day. No offense to my E instructors (who I like), but a lot of time hearing them talk that was aimed at the "lowest common denominator" coach..Residential time should be on the field/experiential learning mostly.

Refs -- that could be a whole thread. I think SRI is doing a better job at making developmental opportunities available. But a ref can screw up 1 game..a bad coach can screw up kids for a lot longer.. Some clubs seem to treat refs as personal fiefdom..reward some kids, etc. The issues to me are more with lack of supervision once trained, lack of feedback mechanism (real constructive feedback, not whining) for coaches on refs (game report is not the answer -- need on-line website), and lack of control by club on parents who hound young kids from the sidelines..

-COL

I read a lot of similar posts about getting kids to play more "unorganized" pick-up soccer. The problem: where you going to find pick-up games for 10 year olds? Kids today don't play pick-up anything any more. Nobody lets their kid take their bike to a park 2 miles away to play unsupervised - and rightfully so. Hate to say it, but playing "pick-up" soccer just isn't going to happen.

So, we're left with organized soccer. My opinion is that kids LIKE playing on a team, with uniforms, in a league, keeping score - even at age 8. I know mine did. My daughter used to get mad when she realized that her U8 games didn't keep score. She knew the score of every 4 v. 4 game she played.

Personally, I wouldn't change much about the structure of the current league system. I like it. I like competition for kids and think they learn more from competing, winning and losing than playing "kick and giggle" soccer.

JB

[Unregistered]

I think you are mistaken about pickup soccer. There is no unorganized soccer because adults have made either made it into a business or made it into their little fiefdoms ( a bit of a generalization, but not an exaggeration either).

Look, take the U8 structure. It's 4 x 4 where you need 10-12 kids on a travel team, 2 fields, 2 coaches, 2 refs...oh, and rosters, player passes, game reports, uniform kits, etc. And it's structured 4 v 4 where the refs and coaches do not consistently know the rules..the better kids launch goal kicks that go 3/4 of the field, etc. Oh, and not sure how all clubs run, but each coach in my organization has his/her own practices, starts to socialize the parents and kids as "our team", and begins the process of building his/her own "stable" of players. Yes, the kids keep score, but so do the parents, coaches..

You could make U8 simply a cohort of kids with a group of coaches. Have a developed set of training plans. All the cohort trains together..randomly split the kids with different coaches (all are doing the same training plan)..throw them together 1/2 way through and let them scrimmage 6 v 6..coaches can only sub and talk to kids on the bench..maybe one acts as a ref.. For the "league", simply have a clearinghouse website where each club puts how many "teams" they could field, let the clubs work out scrimmages where clubs can mix different kids every week..run a couple of formal festivals at the end of the season where clubs can actual put together an actual "rostered" team..as an evaluation method for both players and coaches..instead of these "wink-wink" tryouts where the insiders have already put together the team.. The kids will still keep score of how many goals they scored (good), but the parents & coaches no longer have can.

USYSA development manual says kids need a break in the summer from soccer..my own thought is not so much they need a break from soccer, they need a break from the organized manner it's forced upon them. My club in a mid-Atlantic state had coaches sign up for a couple of hours 3 times during the summer..where they simply showed up at the local park where the club had donated some mid-size goals or snagged the pugg goals from the club's storage shed. That worked out to around 30 days where kids knew they could go to a location and just play..the coach(es) would divy up the kids, hand out pinnies, let the kids play..observe for safety (no actual coaching allowed) and played informal ref..didn't have to be our "club kids"..it was a great recruiting tool.

I get the days of riding to the park with no helmet and staying out until dark with your buddies with your parents only vaguely aware of where you are..those days are gone in most areas. But, there is no reason a lot of clubs couldn't make pickup activities available..except it doesn't fit the model now we have imposed on kids.

I personally think it you wanted better soccer, ban U-10 and below from participating in organized leagues..you would find a lot of creative ideas come out..we default to the league because it makes life easy..and then the people benefiting from the business end have the incentive to make it more and more organized...at earlier ages (travel/comp side). Depending on what sources you cite, the dropout rate in youth soccer by the 13 is anywhere from 50-75%.. any wonder why..

[Unregistered]

Other than the usual Bristol coaches whining about the referees?

The Bristol U12 girls anchor team has three coaches that complain, complain, complain. It's terrible.

Hey Bristol coaches.....let the refs do their jobs. Wipe your tears and get on with it. Your ego is not as imporant as the game itself.

[Unregistered]

The Bristol U12 girls anchor team has three coaches that complain, complain, complain. It's terrible.

Hey Bristol coaches.....let the refs do their jobs. Wipe your tears and get on with it. Your ego is not as imporant as the game itself.

U12 team? The real disgrace is the U14 teams! They are just warming up.