Local kid in Holland Youth Academy - parent's perspective

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:There is tons of public interest and $$$ in the game in this country. If there was no interest, parents would not be ponying up thousands of dollars for the current pay to play system. Our youth development system is a mess because we lack an open professional league that consists of independent clubs.

It's interest is trivial compared to the traditional sports.
True, it has more interest in an area like this where parents are dying to show how much better their kids are than the next persons, but make no mistake, if there was a competitive travel cup stacking league, they'd line up in the DMV to be a part of it, and they'd take private lessons, and try to create more exclusive leagues for only their special kids to compete in...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Facilities. Ok, sorry for this long link:

https://www.google.com/maps/place/German+International+School+Washington+D.C./@39.0114018,-77.1785374,117m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x0:0x1d846fb0e516d38e!8m2!3d39.010847!4d-77.17757

This is the German School located in Potomac, MD. I have been a substitute teacher there a couple of times. They actually have a small soccer field that is part of the campus, and every single day, all the boys at the school play soccer for their entire recess.

Many of them also play on local travel teams, and then a lot of them just play for fun. They take it very seriously, even just playing at lunch time. You're talking a large percentage of the boys in every grade, not just a few kids. They are following the Bundesliga and wearing jerseys to school all the time, and it's serious to them.

Why doesn't every elementary school in the DC Metro area have a turf soccer pitch out back? Well, it's not part of the culture enough to be deemed important enough. Yet, we have basketball courts at EVERY SINGLE SCHOOL, EVERYWHERE.

In Europe, they do have these small soccer "courts" that are the same size as a basketball court, but with goals on either end, so you have kids playing 4v4, 5v5, 6v6, whatever all of the time when they aren't in school. 11 year old kids aren't going to run around a full sized soccer field chasing a ball, but they will play on a smaller sized field.

In Europe, you can probably walk a mile or less to get to some public area where people gather to play soccer. You can do the same here to find a pickup basketball game, but for soccer you have to drive somewhere, which makes it less accessible for the masses.

In the suburbs of the DMV, you have to drive somewhere to do anything, but there are far more kids playing pickup soccer than basketball (not a lot of either, TBF, neither can compete with SC and video games). My kids go to public schools and soccer has always been the most popular sport at recess.

There are plenty of soccer fields around the DMV, and they're usually monopolized by the.pay-to-play clubs because there are so .many teams in the area. No room for pickup games, but a cleat sign of the sport's popularity. What's missing is investment by those making money off the sport at the pro level.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
"As of 2006, over 24 million Americans play soccer. There are 4.2 million players (2.5 million male and 1.7 million female) registered with U.S. Soccer. As of 2012, thirty percent of American households contain someone playing soccer, a figure second only to baseball." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soccer_in_the_United_States

"A Gallup poll released last week found that 7% of Americans named soccer as their favorite sport to watch in a survey completed during December. While that may not sound like much, the figure represents a significant, three-percentage-point gain from just four years ago. Soccer is the only sport to post such a large increase. Football (37%, down from 39%), basketball (11%, down from 12%) and baseball (9%, down from 13%) all showed declining numbers. Hockey was at 4%, up from 3%." https://www.forbes.com/sites/filipbondy/2018/01/08/soccer-will-soon-be-americas-third-favorite-spectator-sport/#7f87c5cc3c53

Population of the US - 325 mn. That means soccer is the favorite sport of 22.75 mn Americans (325 * .07).

In other words, there are more Americans into soccer than the entire population of countries like Chile (18 mn), Netherlands (17 mn), Belgium (12 mn), Portugal (10 mn), Sweden (10 mn), Serbia (9 mn), Costa Rica (5 mn), Croatia (4 mn) and Uruguay (3.5 mn). http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/population-by-country/

Yet all those countries have open soccer markets, with independent clubs competing to get promoted or avoid relegation. And all of those countries have fully funded youth academies, in many cases even in their lower divisions. How many 2nd, 3rd or 4th division clubs in the U.S. even have a youth academy at all, let alone a fully funded one. Yet in Europe and SA it is common.

Just because you have folks that say soccer is their favorite sport doesn't mean they are willing to pay to see a match. Most of the total soccer watching revenue here is in the MLS, and the revenue there is only 2% of the total revenue spread across the ten leagues above them. That means there is 50x more revenue in those top ten. And there are many more leagues with less revenue abroad that aren't counted there. So we have a massive population who say soccer is their favorite, but nobody pays to see it. It all boils down to revenue when it comes to the ability to support youth academies. You want academies, go see a soccer game.

Wrong again. MLS accounts for only 6% of soccer watching in the U.S. http://worldsoccertalk.com/2018/04/19/mls-tv-ratings-concern-given-account-just-6-soccer-tv-viewing/.

It's not soccer that's unpopular here, it's the MLS.

Still, as posted earlier, MLS revenues are almost double that of the Dutch 1st Division.

You are making my point. The MLS, much less any second or third tier teams here cannot attract viewers. No revenue, no youth academy system at the level of the european academies.

MLS is boring. They're their own worst enemies, because they keep tight control on competition to maximize profit and waste money on washed- up Euro players instead of development.

[Anonymous]

Why haven't any South American countries produced any basketball players good enough to be a member of the Harlem Globetrotters?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why haven't any South American countries produced any basketball players good enough to be a member of the Harlem Globetrotters?

Not sure the point of this post, as no basketball fan would ever claim that the Harlem Globetrotters have the best basketball players.

[Anonymous]

https://www.soccerwire.com/news/pro/mls/american-midfielder-ian-harkes-signs-with-scottish-club-dundee-united/?loc=psw

Harkes won the Hermann trophy... "best player in college soccer" and didn't last in MLS for more than 2 years. Shows the gap between college and the pros.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:https://www.soccerwire.com/news/pro/mls/american-midfielder-ian-harkes-signs-with-scottish-club-dundee-united/?loc=psw

Harkes won the Hermann trophy... "best player in college soccer" and didn't last in MLS for more than 2 years. Shows the gap between college and the pros.

Well he’s at Dundee now so...

[Anonymous]

Dundee Utd is in the Scottish Championship, their second division. It's a very weak league.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why haven't any South American countries produced any basketball players good enough to be a member of the Harlem Globetrotters?

Argentina has produced 12 NBA players. Ginobili was a 2x NBA all-star, which is a hell of a lot more impressive than being a Globetrotter. The fact that Argentina is 1/10th the size of the US in terms of population - and a soccer-first country - and has had more success producing basketball players than we have in producing soccer makes the 'culture' argument look pretty hollow.

[Anonymous]

As a parent, my perspective is, why would anyone want to put their kids through that, with such a tiny possibility of actually making a living as a professional?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Dundee Utd is in the Scottish Championship, their second division. It's a very weak league.

Yeah, the whole "he went to Europe" knee jerk reaction is always amusing. This is a lateral move if that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why haven't any South American countries produced any basketball players good enough to be a member of the Harlem Globetrotters?

Did you really just put the Globetrotters at the pinnacle of basketball? Holly crap, that's like saying those fubol freestylers are the best futbol players...it's a gimmicky sideshow. Does it take skills...yes, does it take athletic ability... yes, does it take a script....YES!!! Globe Trotters are like the WWE of basketball.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a parent, my perspective is, why would anyone want to put their kids through that, with such a tiny possibility of actually making a living as a professional?

What is he putting his kid through?

He is becoming a responsible young adult, going to school, getting a true football education, learning to live in a different culture, the travel/life experiences that the kid is getting exposed to are amazing.

Just to get the facts straight, the parent didn't move overseas for his kids' soccer, he moved for work and just happened to have talented kids with one currently getting attention by a major club and now the youth US MNT.

Can't wait for the update on the daughter, she is probably the best footballer in the family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a parent, my perspective is, why would anyone want to put their kids through that, with such a tiny possibility of actually making a living as a professional?

What is he putting his kid through?

He is becoming a responsible young adult, going to school, getting a true football education, learning to live in a different culture, the travel/life experiences that the kid is getting exposed to are amazing.

Just to get the facts straight, the parent didn't move overseas for his kids' soccer, he moved for work and just happened to have talented kids with one currently getting attention by a major club and now the youth US MNT.

Can't wait for the update on the daughter, she is probably the best footballer in the family.

LOL the move wasn't about soccer. That's just his line to get around the FIFA rule on underage transfers. I love the way he sells it, "We just happened to move for work. When we got here my son was just a lowly amateur level player, but after 6 months of hard work and brilliant Dutch coaching, he's now blossomed to this whole other level. I'm totally shocked, but I guess we'll have to stay longer than expected."

The kid was always that level. He was playing a year up for DC United Academy's 03 team (as an 04) before they moved. The move was always 100% about soccer. Good for them for supporting their kid's dream. I think the FIFA rule is BS anyway.

Not sure the daugher is the best player in the family, but she's definitely good. All those kids are early developers though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a parent, my perspective is, why would anyone want to put their kids through that, with such a tiny possibility of actually making a living as a professional?

What is he putting his kid through?

He is becoming a responsible young adult, going to school, getting a true football education, learning to live in a different culture, the travel/life experiences that the kid is getting exposed to are amazing.

Just to get the facts straight, the parent didn't move overseas for his kids' soccer, he moved for work and just happened to have talented kids with one currently getting attention by a major club and now the youth US MNT.

Can't wait for the update on the daughter, she is probably the best footballer in the family.

LOL the move wasn't about soccer. That's just his line to get around the FIFA rule on underage transfers. I love the way he sells it, "We just happened to move for work. When we got here my son was just a lowly amateur level player, but after 6 months of hard work and brilliant Dutch coaching, he's now blossomed to this whole other level. I'm totally shocked, but I guess we'll have to stay longer than expected."

The kid was always that level. He was playing a year up for DC United Academy's 03 team (as an 04) before they moved. The move was always 100% about soccer. Good for them for supporting their kid's dream. I think the FIFA rule is BS anyway.

Not sure the daugher is the best player in the family, but she's definitely good. All those kids are early developers though.

I think if I had the opportunity to move to Europe for work, we'd take it. My kids love soccer so we would let them play.

However, at my kid's current level there is no way I would make the move just for soccer. One is young, so if he really starting blossoming and showing major talent over everyone in the local area at the highest level. Hmmmm.....

This is why we don't have US soccer stars. The kids in the pay-to-play system don't NEED soccer for a better future. They have parents that can afford a nice lifestyle and sent them to a great college. They have kids that it makes more sense to go into a STEM or IT field or a great MBA program. There are kids all over the World where Futbol is their ticket and only way out of certain circumstances or social classes. That's a hunger that 99.9999% of kids in the pay-to-play system do not have.