DA vs ECNL vs everything else

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:^^^
To the Arlington guy:

If Arlington got the DA to replace VDA , then why did they only get a limited DA with only 2 age groups and a pilot program, and not VDA's full DA???

MONEY. They needs the money from single age groups U16 on up. They are no different then ECNL.

Who are all these atlantic U13s supposed to even play after they fly to their various show cases?? Some TX teams? Is that it other then the handful of U13 clubs out here? Rest of the country is U14 or higher.

Anyone trying out for ECNL over this U13 experiment?

Why is NOTHING on the US Soccer website about this? Not inspiring much confidence.

U13s don’t go to showcases moron.

Then honestly what do they do all year for the extra money you are paying _____ play FCV -- Spirit -- take a team bus to Jersey, and then try some futsol?

Listen Loudoun Dad. I know your excited about your new league but you might want to check up on a few facts first.

First, U13 isn’t even required by ECNL. It is an age group that the clubs opt into. Not every ECNL club fields a U13 team. This means that several clubs, including ECNL,find it rather pointless to have a U13 age bracket in what is considered to be a league designed for college showcasing. U13 was always considered “Pre-ECNL” and until GDA the age group never even formally existed. You read that right, before last year, ie, BEFORE DA there was no formal U13 ECNL age group. All the kids just played in their regular leagues.

DA has two pilot divisions with U13 age groups. The Frontier division which also piloted the age group this year has not gone to any DA showcase events. Which means that they did not spend money on such trips. Which means that their money was not wasted on showcase that nobody is watching.

In regards to DA spending all that extra money, well all you have been informed of is your training fees, wait until you get the full bill.

not from Loudoun buddy......but would make sense an FCV jerk like you adds to that great FCV reputation. Ours is actually trying out for DA, and maybe ECNL and we are surrounded by noobs and sheep like you that say clueless $hit like this. All of that is irrelevant to the point. Ours can maybe stay on her club team, do Jeff Cup, skip travel to meaningless showcases with no scouts (or no showcases period for u13 DA), and add a fourth day of private training in at a far lesser cost and hassle of jumping on the bandwagon of "eliteness" ..... yes, it falls in the "everything else" category. But you are in good company saying crap facts like that, I hear it all the time.

[Anonymous]

What I find hypocritically and in fact offends me as a woman who played all the way through college myself is that all these clubs will maintain a boys' DA while abandoning it on the girls' side. If you truly believe that methodology and formula is better, take your boys out of the DA and put them in the boys' ECNL.

Otherwise, this is obviously about power, control, and money, not the girls you claim to serve.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Here is the announcement from ECNL on PDA, MI Hawks and FC Stars joining.

http://www.eliteclubsnationalleague.com/2018/04/18/fc-stars-michigan-hawks-pda-and-more-are-all-in-for-2018-19/

TopDrawerSoccer discussed this announcement on their podcast show this week and said more clubs may announce move back to ECNL by the end of the month. They called this a pivotal moment if not a watershed moment.

Just relaying the facts here FYI.

Thx. I'm actually neutral but first year of 11v11 is a big year to go all-in on a DA experiment. Maybe try ECNL for a year and if is really so horrible and non-elite, switch to DA at U14 when not an experiment and we get to start spending all that money and travel to go to those big DA showcases that everyone on this board is now saying is irrelevant before U15.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Holy crap. Bunch of nubs! Showcasing anyone under u15 is pointless.

Thank god for you and the dc mom's board then.... We all thought we would have showcases like the ECNL.

Let's first let the ECNL fans know their upcoming U13/14 showcase in May is a waste and no one at all will be watching and then lets make sure the DA fanboys update their power points and at least drop the U13 footnote for the 06s

Nubs is too polite

f

Prior to the DA, my DD played ECNL and she went to the U13/U14 showcase. Not a scout anywhere in sight across multiple fields, games, and teams.

Thank you for clearing this up. U13 ECNL has showcases but only parents watching. U13 Pilot DA no showcases period.

Sounds like U13 DA should be giving us some discount over what the U14s pay. I guess we will not have any major travel beyond the few nearby mid-Atlantic states, as we won't do showcases and can't do most tournaments.

So, it is just an extra day of training as PP noted?

Your discount is you are not paying for a unnecessary trip. 2-3 showcases alone are no less than $1500 in travel expenses. There are no team fees for DA events versus ECNL dividing up $800 for Jeff Cup entry fees, $800 for the PDA showcase, $800 for Disney Showcase, $800 for CASL showcase etc. And that is before paying for the required ECNL events.

Bottom line, ECNL is not cheaper.

Thanks. If no team fees for DA events, why is the cost of Pilot DA the same as regular DA? Regular DA receives a subsidized free pass into those events, but we pay $1500 travel. Pilot DA has no events, no subsidization, and also no $1500 travel.

So, it just comes down to Pilot paying the club the same fees as Regular DA for a 4th day of training?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What I find hypocritically and in fact offends me as a woman who played all the way through college myself is that all these clubs will maintain a boys' DA while abandoning it on the girls' side. If you truly believe that methodology and formula is better, take your boys out of the DA and put them in the boys' ECNL.

Otherwise, this is obviously about power, control, and money, not the girls you claim to serve.

DING, DING, DING ...... exactly!

+1000000

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What I find hypocritically and in fact offends me as a woman who played all the way through college myself is that all these clubs will maintain a boys' DA while abandoning it on the girls' side. If you truly believe that methodology and formula is better, take your boys out of the DA and put them in the boys' ECNL.

Otherwise, this is obviously about power, control, and money, not the girls you claim to serve.

Not sure I agree. I can see them getting out because club leaderships thinks ECNL served the girls better than DA. You also might see boys DA backing out and moving to the boys ECNL.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In Messi’s own words: “It took me 17 years and 114 days to become an overnight success. Starting early and staying late. Training day after day after day, year after year.” This is Messi's formula.

No Messi is quick and fast -ie gifted with incredible athleticism. Many people can put in 10,000 hours and love the sport, but if you do not have the physical tools you will not make it.

Messi is saying how he became great and you say no? He says he went early and stayed late, and you refuse to accept that? Don't be asinine. It is a historical fact that Messi was constantly playing soccer, in the streets, in practice, with his older cousins. If he wasn't playing, he was juggling. He grew up with the ball at his feet. Of course some people can train to his level and not become him, because there is a thing called talent, and not every child, no matter how much love and resources a parent provide, has it. But talent alone is not enough, and I see lazy talented players that will never excel because they won't put in the time. Talent you have naturally, but skill - true high level skill - is only developed by spending hours and hours developing that talent and honing it.

I have a friend who played pro in Brazil (no Neymar, but good enough to play professionally). He told me that in Brazil, all they do is soccer all day long. They have academies, they have leagues, and they have the streets. He said it was all he did, before school, after. He lived, ate, and breathed it, and that anyone who becomes great in Brazil - that is their life. Next you will tell me no on that too?

Let's take Ronaldo. Maybe you are just a Real fan. Ronaldo himself says that what took him to the top level is that he has and continues to spend hours upon hours day after day. He says he does so much extra work outside of what we see on the pitch. There are so many stories of how diligently Ronaldo pushes himself during practices.

His current Portugal coach Carlos Queiroz said, “There are some great players that have so much belief that when things are not going well on the training field they just stop. They think, ‘I am good, today is not right, but tomorrow it will be fine.’ They never think there could be a problem. Not Cristiano. He works and works until everything goes right and only then is he satisfied.” Ronaldo is so passionate about practice that he trains for many days to perfect a single area in his game. Queiroz added, “I have always spent time with players on free-kicks but with Ronaldo we worked for days and days. We practised every day. There’s nobody who’s prepared to work harder for his artistry.”

Or would you try to sell me on the idea that this only happened after he became an adult? Success is a habit, and training like that? He did that throughout his youth and was already something of a soccer legend at age 10 in his home town.

I didn't post that to say 10,000 hours is a magic number. I'm sure they don't think that either. If a player is at 9950, not enough? Come on. We all know that's not the point. The point is it takes practice at the sport you are trying to be great at. The point is a longer season of high level training will objectively make you a better player than 6 or 7.

Just remember that the 10,000 hours study was of violinists, not soccer players or of athletes of any kind, and that subsequent studies of athletes showed that some needed just 3,000 hours to become world-class. Maybe you've also heard of the high-jumper who trained for a few hours and was Olympic-caliber? Parents need to let go of the idea that their kid can become a professional athlete by "grinding" on the pitch for 10,000 hours. There's more truth to the cliche "you have it or you don't" than to the idea that 10,000 hours of deliberate practice can make any ol' young soccer player great. Back to the DA discussion . . .

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What I find hypocritically and in fact offends me as a woman who played all the way through college myself is that all these clubs will maintain a boys' DA while abandoning it on the girls' side. If you truly believe that methodology and formula is better, take your boys out of the DA and put them in the boys' ECNL.

Otherwise, this is obviously about power, control, and money, not the girls you claim to serve.

Maybe they really think boys soccer and girls soccer are different and have different goals.

[Anonymous]

Maybe ECNL already served the needs of club players and although DA painted a great picture, it failed to meet expectations so club decided to return to a proven model.

[Anonymous]

USSF is weak. The people in charge are weak. Lying down in the fetile position with their thumbs in their mouths.

ECNL starting drama at tryout time. Making people believe more is to come, causing panic...etc.

And what does the USSF do...nothing. They take it like a bunch of punks.

So there you have it. US Soccer. No fight.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What I find hypocritically and in fact offends me as a woman who played all the way through college myself is that all these clubs will maintain a boys' DA while abandoning it on the girls' side. If you truly believe that methodology and formula is better, take your boys out of the DA and put them in the boys' ECNL.

Otherwise, this is obviously about power, control, and money, not the girls you claim to serve.

Not sure I agree. I can see them getting out because club leaderships thinks ECNL served the girls better than DA. You also might see boys DA backing out and moving to the boys ECNL.

There is so much wrong being said on this forum, it’s hard to know where to begin. This thread reflects US Youth soccer in so many ways, primarily through the fact it's based on BAD INFORMATION. Like it or not, most American youth soccer parents are very, very uneducated. They do not know what the game should look like. They do not know what proper training methods should look like. And they do not understand the game, the actual game. Many probably never played. Let’s see if we can tease out one issue: the importance of methodology of a league (and the teams in it) and what is the true brass tax difference between the ECNL and DA conceptually.

To a certain extent we can say that all the leagues accept the DA function the same way, including the ECNL. The 2 main things the ECNL did that was a different was:
1. To gather all the top female athletes together in one league that spanned across the nation (as we really can’t say the US Youth Soccer National Leagues quite functioned in that way).
2. They did put some re-entry restrictions, whereas historically there had been none, though now other leagues have started following suit (such as the NPL at least in some areas).

However, the ECNL had largely the same fundamental methodology as any other league, including the CCL and NPL:
1. ODP not banned
2. Takes off for the high school season, so it is necessarily a shorter season: ~6 months of league with some pre-high school season showcases. The ECNL league ended end of December (for our conference at least).
3. 3 day a week practices (some ECNL teams do practice 4 days a week, usually the ones that have a boys DA program, to satisfy complaints by parents that the ECNL wasn’t being run on the same level and therefore girls weren’t getting enough in the whole separate but equal explanation).

The DA is fundamentally, methodologically founded on different principles. You can love or hate them, but if you deny those, please see your local therapist:
1. No ODP or high school because the season is a full 10 months.
• There is no way I can take you seriously if you claim that high school practices are the same quality as club practices, and I live in an area where the soccer is important enough that the school has to hire a club coach to coach the varsity team. He made some changes, but still can’t really fully change the culture of high school soccer.
• There has been extensive, scientific research done over and over again that any of you can google for yourselves that says that playing 2-3 games a week increases injury rate as much as 6 times. So why do high schools and colleges do it? Historically it was because US athletes didn’t try to go pro in soccer. It was just another sport, so it needed a shorter season to cram it in with the other sports a student was playing. Even colleges are trying to move away from that model and are considering a year round soccer season with one game a week. It is a movement gaining momentum that you can again google for yourself.
2. No re-entry at all. I hear a lot of whining about that one. One important rationale is to make players play their hardest because if they aren’t, they will be pulled out and not go back in. Does it work? Yep. My DD has embraced fitness as a survival necessity to stay in the starters and stay in the game. What happens when you don’t? Just one example: I know an ECNL team with a player that is obese. There is no other way to put it. She is visually clearly overweight and can’t play a full half, much less a full game. But she does have a great shot and some decent foot work. They put her in to score goals, then pull her out so she can recover. Then they put her in again the next half. It wins them games, but that’s not development.
3. Mandatory 4 day a week practices for all clubs.
4. No more than 2 games in 2 days in a row, with a rest period in between. No other league, no other showcase does that. Why? Because 3 days of games in a row increases injury rates.
That is a methodological principle in the DA to protect players, even though it requires the event be longer.
• Research supports the need of recovery between games. Not to come back to the earlier point, but the high school soccer model is insane, and the injury rates support what I’m trying to educate you on. Players run an average of 6 to 9 miles a game (basically a 10K. Even cross country teams wait after a competition for at least a week, maybe two weeks, after a meet. But our young athletes are playing routinely 2-3 games a week.

These are all structural league differences. I have added rationales (which yes, I believe the reasoning behind a decision matters). But even if you want to argue the rationales, the differences are the differences. So you have to ask yourself, which methodology do you believe has the ingredients to protect your DD and to develop her best as a player? A shorter or longer season? Restrictions on how many games in a row or not? Etc etc.

If you believe that the ECNL is better, you had better believe so for how it is structured, or I call bull sh**. Now, could these clubs go “all in” on the boys side? Yes!! PDA, Michagan Hawks, and FC Stars already have boys ECNL teams. So go for it then, if that’s what they believe. At least then I could respect that they are choosing a methodology.

Other than being structured differently, to a certain extent, we could say a league is really only a function of the teams that are in it. If the ECNL and DA were ran the same way, then I would just run down the list, find the better competition and go there. I’m choosing the philosophy of my DD getting more training and on an organization that cares if she gets injured or not, and structures accordingly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Maybe ECNL already served the needs of club players and although DA painted a great picture, it failed to meet expectations so club decided to return to a proven model.

I love how people talk about the ECNL now as they see it after it spent years becoming what it is. Your children were probably all too small for you to know how it started off. For example, Richmond Strikers had an ECNL team that couldn't beat a single "regular" elite team in the region. The ECNL was kind of a joke, and many considered it simply an expensive way to showcase your child.

I say that to point out what should be obvious: year one sucked for the ECNL too, so why is everyone so ridiculous in their expectations for the GDA?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In Messi’s own words: “It took me 17 years and 114 days to become an overnight success. Starting early and staying late. Training day after day after day, year after year.” This is Messi's formula.

No Messi is quick and fast -ie gifted with incredible athleticism. Many people can put in 10,000 hours and love the sport, but if you do not have the physical tools you will not make it.

Messi is saying how he became great and you say no? He says he went early and stayed late, and you refuse to accept that? Don't be asinine. It is a historical fact that Messi was constantly playing soccer, in the streets, in practice, with his older cousins. If he wasn't playing, he was juggling. He grew up with the ball at his feet. Of course some people can train to his level and not become him, because there is a thing called talent, and not every child, no matter how much love and resources a parent provide, has it. But talent alone is not enough, and I see lazy talented players that will never excel because they won't put in the time. Talent you have naturally, but skill - true high level skill - is only developed by spending hours and hours developing that talent and honing it.

I have a friend who played pro in Brazil (no Neymar, but good enough to play professionally). He told me that in Brazil, all they do is soccer all day long. They have academies, they have leagues, and they have the streets. He said it was all he did, before school, after. He lived, ate, and breathed it, and that anyone who becomes great in Brazil - that is their life. Next you will tell me no on that too?

Let's take Ronaldo. Maybe you are just a Real fan. Ronaldo himself says that what took him to the top level is that he has and continues to spend hours upon hours day after day. He says he does so much extra work outside of what we see on the pitch. There are so many stories of how diligently Ronaldo pushes himself during practices.

His current Portugal coach Carlos Queiroz said, “There are some great players that have so much belief that when things are not going well on the training field they just stop. They think, ‘I am good, today is not right, but tomorrow it will be fine.’ They never think there could be a problem. Not Cristiano. He works and works until everything goes right and only then is he satisfied.” Ronaldo is so passionate about practice that he trains for many days to perfect a single area in his game. Queiroz added, “I have always spent time with players on free-kicks but with Ronaldo we worked for days and days. We practised every day. There’s nobody who’s prepared to work harder for his artistry.”

Or would you try to sell me on the idea that this only happened after he became an adult? Success is a habit, and training like that? He did that throughout his youth and was already something of a soccer legend at age 10 in his home town.

I didn't post that to say 10,000 hours is a magic number. I'm sure they don't think that either. If a player is at 9950, not enough? Come on. We all know that's not the point. The point is it takes practice at the sport you are trying to be great at. The point is a longer season of high level training will objectively make you a better player than 6 or 7.

Just remember that the 10,000 hours study was of violinists, not soccer players or of athletes of any kind, and that subsequent studies of athletes showed that some needed just 3,000 hours to become world-class. Maybe you've also heard of the high-jumper who trained for a few hours and was Olympic-caliber? Parents need to let go of the idea that their kid can become a professional athlete by "grinding" on the pitch for 10,000 hours. There's more truth to the cliche "you have it or you don't" than to the idea that 10,000 hours of deliberate practice can make any ol' young soccer player great. Back to the DA discussion . . .

God bless America and all the ships at see. Still hung up on the 10,000 number? The point was and remains that you have to put consistent quality time in training over a long period of time to become skilled. I gave several examples of high level pros who trained and continue to train extensively. They didn't take half the year off year after year the way some of you are arguing for. By the way, high jumping is such a different sport, I can't believe you even tried to compare them. Tennis, basketball, soccer, lacrosse, are not only sports of athleticism, but tactical as well.

[Anonymous]

^^^ oops, I obviously meant sea.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What I find hypocritically and in fact offends me as a woman who played all the way through college myself is that all these clubs will maintain a boys' DA while abandoning it on the girls' side. If you truly believe that methodology and formula is better, take your boys out of the DA and put them in the boys' ECNL.

Otherwise, this is obviously about power, control, and money, not the girls you claim to serve.

Maybe they really think boys soccer and girls soccer are different and have different goals.

Hahaha! I love your sarcasm!! =)