ECNL moving to school year not calendar

[Anonymous]

"No change for the 2025-2026 season. There should be no registration change for the
2025-2026 season. This allows organizations transitioning to school year calendars to
prepare their operations and provide the best experience for all participants. The
RECOMMENDATION is based on overwhelming feedback from the engagement process."

US Club will change next fall, believe that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My son will be a trap year next year according to this. Wish they could get their act together so we could avoid this. Was looking forward to the change but now not so much. Set it up for 25/26 or keep it the same. One year of everyone jockeying for position just doesn’t sound appealing.

Their act is together. They just are not doing what you want. Big difference. They know what they are doing. You just do not like it.

[Anonymous]

So is the goal now for clubs to add no trapped players to rosters in fall 2025?

Or for all their teams to have 2-3 that can shift down to the next age group?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:"No change for the 2025-2026 season. There should be no registration change for the
2025-2026 season. This allows organizations transitioning to school year calendars to
prepare their operations and provide the best experience for all participants. The
RECOMMENDATION is based on overwhelming feedback from the engagement process."

US Club will change next fall, believe that.

Some organizations will change next year, some will not. That’s the big takeaway. They gave some numbers on the survey results. It was pretty split 41% vs 47% over which system people want. Either way there will be a lot of unhappy ones. Their conclusion was that the preference was different across different parts of the country with different school registrations, and across recreation/travel/national platforms. Therefore, they will allow freedom for communities and organizations to choose the best thing for them.

It’s hard to argue with this conclusion. Let those closest to it make their own decisions. Even if it means there will be some messiness there would have been messiness with any decision.

[Anonymous]

Real or not, this is a very reasonable framework. The one-size-fits all has to go, especially if it is modeled after the national teams' preference.

The USYNT can stay BY without affecting anyone else. Those teams are already put by players of various ages.

If ECNL's primary focus is college placement, aligning to SY makes the most sense but it will not affect rosters very much hence the idea that they can be the first to switch.

For competitive travel, SY would likely have the biggest impact on rosters so that transition would be tougher/longer if they choose to change.

Rec would most likely prefer SY as well because of the same-grade, friends and community focused participation.

Allowing a year time for everyone to plan and communicate is very reasonable. There is no reason to believe that this change would have been forced on everyone within months time for the next season.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Real or not, this is a very reasonable framework. The one-size-fits all has to go, especially if it is modeled after the national teams' preference.

The USYNT can stay BY without affecting anyone else. Those teams are already put by players of various ages.

If ECNL's primary focus is college placement, aligning to SY makes the most sense but it will not affect rosters very much hence the idea that they can be the first to switch.

For competitive travel, SY would likely have the biggest impact on rosters so that transition would be tougher/longer if they choose to change.

Rec would most likely prefer SY as well because of the same-grade, friends and community focused participation.

Allowing a year time for everyone to plan and communicate is very reasonable. There is no reason to believe that this change would have been forced on everyone within months time for the next season.

Forced on and not allowing to change are different.

[Anonymous]

According to the “release” by US Soccer a majority of members agree that SY is the way to go. What is even more telling is the members who want to stick with BY the driving factor was dealing with the change, specifically the tech platforms. Wow, so a few lines of code in Got Soccer, league apps, PlayMetrics, etc. are the major obstacles? Further, they thank everyone but ECNL, which is also very telling and open to a lot of speculation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My son will be a trap year next year according to this. Wish they could get their act together so we could avoid this. Was looking forward to the change but now not so much. Set it up for 25/26 or keep it the same. One year of everyone jockeying for position just doesn’t sound appealing.

So your child should be the driving force in pushing this through with less than six months from next year's tryouts? Maybe spend less time on here and more on training your child to be a better player so it doesn't matter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:According to the “release” by US Soccer a majority of members agree that SY is the way to go. What is even more telling is the members who want to stick with BY the driving factor was dealing with the change, specifically the tech platforms. Wow, so a few lines of code in Got Soccer, league apps, PlayMetrics, etc. are the major obstacles? Further, they thank everyone but ECNL, which is also very telling and open to a lot of speculation.

I was thinking the same. Driving factor is dealing with change, wow. Force clubs to get to work and US soccer as well to make this happen now. Waiting a year and being wishy washy is a bad look.

[Anonymous]

How long until ECNL announces or leaks their plan?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:According to the “release” by US Soccer a majority of members agree that SY is the way to go. What is even more telling is the members who want to stick with BY the driving factor was dealing with the change, specifically the tech platforms. Wow, so a few lines of code in Got Soccer, league apps, PlayMetrics, etc. are the major obstacles? Further, they thank everyone but ECNL, which is also very telling and open to a lot of speculation.

Probably because the people making money in travel soccer (i.e. stealing money from naive and gullible parents with promises of future fame, glory and scholarships) are usually older men or ex-players with very little high end education or techical expertise in the real world. In other words, they are about as tech savvy as your grandmother. I wouldn't be surprised of most of them have trouble understanding how their cell phones work and can't consistently set their DVRs to record programs to save their lives.

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:For club players their last chance to impress is their junior year season. For Trapped players they basically dont have a normal team to play on and have to hope that they have been spotted in their sophomore year.

Trapped players don’t lose their junior season….

Yes they do. Why you ask? Because during their prime recruiting year when they should be at showcases, they are on a team full of seniors who are focussed elsewhere and bail out- especially if they have decided they don’t want to play in college. They don’t want to go to showcases (too busy studying for SAT, applications etc) and they just don’t care by that point. The junior player is at the beck and call of a team of checked out seniors. Could they go find another club. Of course! But it would still be with seniors who in a different life stage with different priorities. They can’t even get the seniors out to practice 3 days a week much less travel to all the showcases-especially those in March- May which should be the prime time for the junior. It’s an albatross being on a senior team when you are not a senior.

Jesus man, listen to yourself. You’re blaming other kids for your kids outcome.

What you’re saying is “they don’t have the team I want them to have, with a focus the benefits my kid.”

Clearly your club doesn’t send teams to nationals or even the consolation nationals, and the kids have nothing to play for (including college). Sounds like a club change is needed, not a universal rule change.

You misread it. They are faulting the calendar year date cutoffs for putting kids in different school grades on the same team.

No they got it right. Everything is everyone else's fault. Grow up, actively recruit for your decent player. If your kid is good enough coaches will be interested. Stop blaming everything else under the sun for why a 'younger kid' doesn't make it to whatever you expect them to make. Kids making National teams at 15/16 and the a national team in their late teens should be more than enough to make you fall birthday parents shut up about how unfair the world is to your previous fall babies.

Face facts: your kid isn't as great as you think they are. That's the problem not the birth cut off.

Fun fact: your kid isn’t good. Just older. Good luck on the B team. Sorry man. Maybe invest time in helping your kid develop skills instead of whining about the change.

The logic these sorts of takes required is astounding.

“My younger but same age kid isn’t as good as your older but same age kid, but my kid is ACTUALLY better because they are younger and have (1 to 11) months to make up an deficiencies.”

It’s such an outsider perspective that is uninformed.

If the kids are 8/9 sure…you’ve got time.

10/12…better hurry up and close that gap.

13+ the ability to bridge the gap becomes exponentially harder and more expensive (hence why all sports lose nearly 80% of their youth players at this stage).

Hard truth! If you’re not the best or in the “top” mix between 8-12 you are not going to be the best at 13+ and very rarely will you make the jump to be “in the mix.”

The goal of every top 8-12yo is to increase the talent delta between themselves and the rest. The idea that some “Moe” big dumb oaf is taking up all the high talent roster spots is 20 years out of date.

[Anonymous]

Assuming the US soccer document is legit. How does the decision of 8/1 vs 9/1 work? Take northern VA 9/1 would make the most sense. Who sets that? NCSL, ECRL? Virginia youth soccer?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Assuming the US soccer document is legit. How does the decision of 8/1 vs 9/1 work? Take northern VA 9/1 would make the most sense. Who sets that? NCSL, ECRL? Virginia youth soccer?

Not Virginia Youth Soccer. That’s under the USYSA umbrella. It’ll be US Club soccer or whatever league your kid is in

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Assuming the US soccer document is legit. How does the decision of 8/1 vs 9/1 work? Take northern VA 9/1 would make the most sense. Who sets that? NCSL, ECRL? Virginia youth soccer?

Not Virginia Youth Soccer. That’s under the USYSA umbrella. It’ll be US Club soccer or whatever league your kid is in

Right so take a club. Their top team plays ECRL, the lower teams play NCSL. For that club it would be really complicated if those teams played in leagues with different cutoffs?