MLS Next Announcement

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Now there will be school year age MLS 2 teams filled with end of year kids from the older birth year that can probably beat the true birth year MLS 1 teams within the same club. How confusing is that. Say you have a bunch of late birth year 2012s who don’t quite make MLS 1 as 2012s. They will then be on the 2013 MLS 2 team which will probably be better than the 2013 MLS 1 team with all true 2013s bc most or even all of the 2013 MLS 2 team could be born in 2012 🫠

If the age range is from Aug to July, then the teams will all have kids born in 2 different years
There's no more 2013's or 2012's as an age group

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How does this work for non MLS events. Do tournaments starting follow School-Year age groups. They haven't allowed players to "play down" an age year.

MLS Next will be quite fine with all their teams being BY at their tournaments as they do now

You're trying to mix MLS Next with MLS Next 2

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Now there will be school year age MLS 2 teams filled with end of year kids from the older birth year that can probably beat the true birth year MLS 1 teams within the same club. How confusing is that. Say you have a bunch of late birth year 2012s who don’t quite make MLS 1 as 2012s. They will then be on the 2013 MLS 2 team which will probably be better than the 2013 MLS 1 team with all true 2013s bc most or even all of the 2013 MLS 2 team could be born in 2012 🫠

If the age range is from Aug to July, then the teams will all have kids born in 2 different years
There's no more 2013's or 2012's as an age group

MLS 1 is still birth year, MLS 2 is SY and many clubs have both.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Now there will be school year age MLS 2 teams filled with end of year kids from the older birth year that can probably beat the true birth year MLS 1 teams within the same club. How confusing is that. Say you have a bunch of late birth year 2012s who don’t quite make MLS 1 as 2012s. They will then be on the 2013 MLS 2 team which will probably be better than the 2013 MLS 1 team with all true 2013s bc most or even all of the 2013 MLS 2 team could be born in 2012 🫠

This exactly

[Anonymous]

Which club has already announced this??

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Beginning in the 2026-27 season, player registration for within MLS NEXT will be as follows: Allstate Homegrown Division will continue to use Birth-Year age groups (January 1 - December 31). Academy Division will change to School-Year age groups (August 1 - July 31).

Player registration via Birth-Year remains the optimal structure for the Allstate Homegrown Division, as it aligns with FIFA standards, the global professional pathway and greatly benefits our youth national teams.

The School Year age group system is the most suitable structure for the Academy Division, as it aligns with the broader youth soccer landscape across the United States and creates opportunities for continued collaboration and growth between MLS NEXT and the wider youth soccer ecosystem.

Discuss!

it's been confirmed by our club. email went out today

What club is this? Fake

[Anonymous]

And just think, only a few months ago, clubs (probably via MLSN's rec) were selling MLS2 by saying each age group of tier 1 and tier 2 were "a pool of players" where tier 2 standouts could be moved up and tier 1 bench players could be moved down to get more minutes.

What a steaming crock of sh*t that was, lmao.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Beginning in the 2026-27 season, player registration for within MLS NEXT will be as follows: Allstate Homegrown Division will continue to use Birth-Year age groups (January 1 - December 31). Academy Division will change to School-Year age groups (August 1 - July 31).

Player registration via Birth-Year remains the optimal structure for the Allstate Homegrown Division, as it aligns with FIFA standards, the global professional pathway and greatly benefits our youth national teams.

The School Year age group system is the most suitable structure for the Academy Division, as it aligns with the broader youth soccer landscape across the United States and creates opportunities for continued collaboration and growth between MLS NEXT and the wider youth soccer ecosystem.

Discuss!

it's been confirmed by our club. email went out today

What club is this? Fake

It’s on mlsnext instagram. I can believe people think this is fake and that would be funny if it wasn’t reality.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And just think, only a few months ago, clubs (probably via MLSN's rec) were selling MLS2 by saying each age group of tier 1 and tier 2 were "a pool of players" where tier 2 standouts could be moved up and tier 1 bench players could be moved down to get more minutes.

What a steaming crock of sh*t that was, lmao.

It actually worked like that at our club. Changing the ages seems like a disaster.

[Anonymous]

It only works like that at clubs that don’t have a big pool of talent to pull from. At our club, MLS next one is kept sealed off from the second tier kids. The coaches are arrogant jerks that think they’re coaching in the Premier league.

[Anonymous]

So how would it work when the MLS next team is playing in a tournament? For example, mls next team is birth year U14 playing in the Columbia cup. They play against the u14s that are an MLS next to team at a different club that have to play school year. So it’s feasible there would be a full year of difference between the kids if you had one team have mainly older kids and the other team have mainly younger kids in their school year. What would you do in that case? That’s not fair.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:And just think, only a few months ago, clubs (probably via MLSN's rec) were selling MLS2 by saying each age group of tier 1 and tier 2 were "a pool of players" where tier 2 standouts could be moved up and tier 1 bench players could be moved down to get more minutes.

What a steaming crock of sh*t that was, lmao.

It actually worked like that at our club. Changing the ages seems like a disaster.

We've seen it some at our club too, even if it's just bringing tier 2 kids up to train with tier 1 teams for a week or two. Haven't seen or heard of any tier 1 players playing down a level in matches though. I do expect some player movement post Fest though.

I agree it seems like a disaster having SY/BY teams in every age group. Am sure the p2p clubs with teams in each tier are thrilled

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So how would it work when the MLS next team is playing in a tournament? For example, mls next team is birth year U14 playing in the Columbia cup. They play against the u14s that are an MLS next to team at a different club that have to play school year. So it’s feasible there would be a full year of difference between the kids if you had one team have mainly older kids and the other team have mainly younger kids in their school year. What would you do in that case? That’s not fair.

MLSN1 teams wont play in SY tournamants

Pretty easy to figure out.

ECNL teams will never get an opportunity.to play against Homegrown teams.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Now there will be school year age MLS 2 teams filled with end of year kids from the older birth year that can probably beat the true birth year MLS 1 teams within the same club. How confusing is that. Say you have a bunch of late birth year 2012s who don’t quite make MLS 1 as 2012s. They will then be on the 2013 MLS 2 team which will probably be better than the 2013 MLS 1 team with all true 2013s bc most or even all of the 2013 MLS 2 team could be born in 2012 🫠

If the age range is from Aug to July, then the teams will all have kids born in 2 different years
There's no more 2013's or 2012's as an age group

There will be pure 2012 and 2013 teams in MLS 1 which is exactly what I was talking about. I think there will be some teams that are labeled MLS 2 within a club that are stronger than the same clubs MLS 1 team because the 2 team will be comprised mostly of kids between August and December of the prior birth year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So how would it work when the MLS next team is playing in a tournament? For example, mls next team is birth year U14 playing in the Columbia cup. They play against the u14s that are an MLS next to team at a different club that have to play school year. So it’s feasible there would be a full year of difference between the kids if you had one team have mainly older kids and the other team have mainly younger kids in their school year. What would you do in that case? That’s not fair.

Mlsn1 teams won’t play outside tournaments or if they did a u15 BY team would be playing up against a u15 SY team.