Playing Option Outside of Club

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Nobody seems to be answering your question, which I think is essentially: Where else can a good player play, when they are at a big club that will lock their player card, even at a young age, and the regular season is not offering them enough of a challenge?

1. Ask about guest-playing one or even two years up with her home club, especially on the second or even third team. Most clubs are very happy to accommodate that in some way, for top players. Playing against bigger, stronger players can be a good challenge, even if the overall skill level is lower.

2. Futsal. There are tons of options, including year-round; usually does not conflict with the player card and can help with speed of game play.

3. Organizing 3v3 and 5v5 teams. You can Google and see lots of options. This requires some coordination by the families, and the tournaments can be hit-or-miss - you can have all easy opponents and no competitive games, or you can get combined with an older age group that actually has strong teams and get annihilated. Both are bad. But there can also be fun, competitive days with tons of touches.

All that said, I do agree with other posters that the games aren't actually that important for development at the young ages. It's best to spend less time schlepping to games, and more time training on the ball.

Great post. One difference of opinion on games vs individual training. Skills on a game vs skills executed in the garage are very different. Best rule of thumb, if you can’t execute the skill(s) in a game, you can’t execute the skill. Games matter. Maybe find some opportunities to use games, like the 3v3 or 5v5, or futsal, or an indoor league, to practice the skills she’s working on at home in a live competitive environment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wondering what other options are out there for our U10 daughter whose team will not be playing in the top NCSL division. The club communicated the top team will be playing in the second division and we are worried the speed of play will hinder her development.

Outside of year round futsal programs, what option would she have to play at a higher level outside of her main team without having any player card conflicts?

It sounds like you're more concerned about status than speed of play. At that age there isn't going to be a noticeable difference.

[Anonymous]

you should be happy you don't have to play against the top team from Arlington, Loudon, VSA, PWSI, McLean, and all the teams that will blow your team out 10-0.

Don't worry about it. At U11 they all go to another league and you can play against more evenly matched teams.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:you should be happy you don't have to play against the top team from Arlington, Loudon, VSA, PWSI, McLean, and all the teams that will blow your team out 10-0.

Don't worry about it. At U11 they all go to another league and you can play against more evenly matched teams.

On the girls side a good number of the top u10 teams are playing u11 this season.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wondering what other options are out there for our U10 daughter whose team will not be playing in the top NCSL division. The club communicated the top team will be playing in the second division and we are worried the speed of play will hinder her development.

Outside of year round futsal programs, what option would she have to play at a higher level outside of her main team without having any player card conflicts?

It sounds like you're more concerned about status than speed of play. At that age there isn't going to be a noticeable difference.

I wouldn't worry about it at that age at all. The good thing about NCSL is that at U11, the actually promote and relegate teams. You can see how your team stacks up against about 40 other teams. It won't be as bad as you think. Sure, there will be uneven matches, but overall should be good. Also, sign up for tournaments in the hardest bracket if you want a good litmus test for your team/ player.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wondering what other options are out there for our U10 daughter whose team will not be playing in the top NCSL division. The club communicated the top team will be playing in the second division and we are worried the speed of play will hinder her development.

Outside of year round futsal programs, what option would she have to play at a higher level outside of her main team without having any player card conflicts?

It sounds like you're more concerned about status than speed of play. At that age there isn't going to be a noticeable difference.

I wouldn't worry about it at that age at all. The good thing about NCSL is that at U11, the actually promote and relegate teams. You can see how your team stacks up against about 40 other teams. It won't be as bad as you think. Sure, there will be uneven matches, but overall should be good. Also, sign up for tournaments in the hardest bracket if you want a good litmus test for your team/ player.

At U11 and U12, the better clubs have started to pull their top teams from NCSL or they are playing them up an age group.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wondering what other options are out there for our U10 daughter whose team will not be playing in the top NCSL division. The club communicated the top team will be playing in the second division and we are worried the speed of play will hinder her development.

Outside of year round futsal programs, what option would she have to play at a higher level outside of her main team without having any player card conflicts?

It sounds like you're more concerned about status than speed of play. At that age there isn't going to be a noticeable difference.

I wouldn't worry about it at that age at all. The good thing about NCSL is that at U11, the actually promote and relegate teams. You can see how your team stacks up against about 40 other teams. It won't be as bad as you think. Sure, there will be uneven matches, but overall should be good. Also, sign up for tournaments in the hardest bracket if you want a good litmus test for your team/ player.

At U11 and U12, the better clubs have started to pull their top teams from NCSL or they are playing them up an age group.

Are the top U11/U12 girls teams doing VPSL, which seems to be an actual pre-ECNL league for the boys this year? Our U11 boys are playing VPSL, not NCSL this year. For the U11 spring, I think the plan is two leagues: VPSL + play up a year in EDP. So no NCSL.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:you should be happy you don't have to play against the top team from Arlington, Loudon, VSA, PWSI, McLean, and all the teams that will blow your team out 10-0.

Don't worry about it. At U11 they all go to another league and you can play against more evenly matched teams.

On the girls side a good number of the top u10 teams are playing u11 this season.

I don’t understand the rush for teams to play up, especially for 9v9. Aren’t more touches better? And the fields aren’t any bigger for 9v9 so you don’t even have the benefit of that. Better competition against 3rd or 4th division teams?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:you should be happy you don't have to play against the top team from Arlington, Loudon, VSA, PWSI, McLean, and all the teams that will blow your team out 10-0.

Don't worry about it. At U11 they all go to another league and you can play against more evenly matched teams.

On the girls side a good number of the top u10 teams are playing u11 this season.

I don’t understand the rush for teams to play up, especially for 9v9. Aren’t more touches better? And the fields aren’t any bigger for 9v9 so you don’t even have the benefit of that. Better competition against 3rd or 4th division teams?

Because of parents.

Good coaches don't want to rush anything, and often keep 5-a-side and other small sided in practice as much as possible.

But parents operate on “my future star should play ‘real soccer’ because he / she is good enough.”

And the timeless “when I played we didn’t have any of this 7v7, 9v9 stuff. Junior is better than I ever was, he should be playing 11-a-side.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:you should be happy you don't have to play against the top team from Arlington, Loudon, VSA, PWSI, McLean, and all the teams that will blow your team out 10-0.

Don't worry about it. At U11 they all go to another league and you can play against more evenly matched teams.

On the girls side a good number of the top u10 teams are playing u11 this season.

I don’t understand the rush for teams to play up, especially for 9v9. Aren’t more touches better? And the fields aren’t any bigger for 9v9 so you don’t even have the benefit of that. Better competition against 3rd or 4th division teams?

The clubs can say the kids get more playing time? The rosters are the same number for the 7v7. But yes less touches. The fields can be bigger. Also no more break out line.

[Anonymous]

How about just playing a different sport in your spare time. My kids benefited greatly from playing multiple sports in the early years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How about just playing a different sport in your spare time. My kids benefited greatly from playing multiple sports in the early years.

Articulate the benefits please

[Anonymous]

There are literally tons. The top one being that it allows kids to use and strengthen other parts of their body that they otherwise wouldn’t use just playing soccer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There are literally tons. The top one being that it allows kids to use and strengthen other parts of their body that they otherwise wouldn’t use just playing soccer.

So it's not benefits to improve soccer development, its overall benefits.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There are literally tons. The top one being that it allows kids to use and strengthen other parts of their body that they otherwise wouldn’t use just playing soccer.

So it's not benefits to improve soccer development, its overall benefits.

Well, if it benefits your kid overall it will also benefit their soccer playing. Soccer is a physical sport and being stronger and injured less would certainly be a benefit. Playing another sport could also help prevent burnout which is a real problem.