That's because it's not a mixed team. There are one or two players who will sometimes guest, but it's not a mixed team. The vast majority of these kids are on age. On multiple boy ages at SYC, there are kids starting and playing who are playing up with the team as well, meaning a few kids have a net effect of playing up two years when they play. So being worried about how the team is named and if they have a guest player or two at one of those tournaments gets sillier when you actually start to break it apart too. More often than not, there are more double age group under kids on the pitch when this happens than on age guests. As far as ranking go, playing up isn't how you rig the system, that's not how they work. Gotsoccer ranking are tournament accumulation points based on the "level" of the tournament, which is mostly ranked on what tier software service the tournament organizer has paid for. This system rewards teams for playing many tournaments, but almost exclusively winning or at worst making a championship in higher rated tournaments. There are no extra points for playing up unless there are better teams. This systems is actually harder to move up in. The other one people use here is the soccer rankings app, which is similar to all the computer polls you've seen in football for years. These tend to reward teams who either blow out teams rated similarly to them or beat higher rated teams, whether on age or not. Older teams are typically rated higher as a group than the collective of teams a year younger, so there may be some advantage to playing older teams that are more highly rated, but only if you're competitive with those highly rated teams. Using the 2012 SYC boys teams as the example, had they played and won out at EDP on age, they would have picked up nearly twice as many points as they did for finishing upper-mid table an age up. In the soccer ranking app, they'd slot in as the #5 team at 2011 age group based on their rating, so anytime they don't have big GD wins against the majority of 2011 teams, their rating also suffers. That's how the systems each work, their inputs are pretty publicly available, so feel free to check them out yourself. On the other hand though, it doesn't really matter, because they're still in elementary school. My personal opinion is that they play up because it helps with the development of their players to play with faster, stronger kids who can test them. For all the second team whining on these boards, it also gives an opportunity for that second team to play in the top brackets of local tournaments and work against top team kids, helping their development as well. It's a win for everybody, in all the situations that are normally complained about on this board. Let's give them some credit for working hard, finding competition to push their kids, and giving their second teams a shot at playing in higher level tournaments to push them. |
Of all the messed up things that go on there this is certainly the oddest criticism of all. I agree who cares if they have kids playing up?? This actually a good thing. |
It's more than one or two kids playing with younger teams. When you've played them for years, you know the players. Playing up is not a problem. Continue to defend all must. With mutiple players, I've learned these things balance out as the kids get older. |
You did not understand. No one said playing up rigs the system. If you are playing up at anytime and winning with older players and and you're ranked as a younger team, this skews the system when you are being compared to a younger team who does not use older players. No matter how much you write, this is not difficult to understand. |
Got it. Yes, that’s messed up. |
Nope, I got it. You implied they're cheating the system by playing up and sometimes having a player or two on age. I'm telling you that unless they're blowing out those older kids, it doesn't matter at all, even if we've decided we're caring about ranking 11 year olds. Let's ignore you're making this sound like a regular roster thing with many older players, because it isn't and instead explore whether or not it matters. You seem to be making the argument that they're unfairly ranked #1 at 2012 in Virginia because they play up and get results using those older players. So let's take a look at the listing of scorings on both these sites. Whoops - they haven't played a local team on age to within 2 goals in over a year, with the exception of a draw with Pipeline and a loss to Coppermine. Arlington? 5-0, 4-2. VYS? 9-1. Herndon? 9-0. PWSI 5-0. Loudoun 11-0. VSA 7-0. So are they unfairly ranked #1? They've showed that playing on age isn't a good game for either side, so instead of continuing to just collect trophies, they're playing up to get competitive games. Plenty of other things to argue about, trying to pick an argument about whether or not this group of 11yo's should be ranked over your DS's team is silly, because this group has shown over the past few years that they'll play anyone and is really good. |
Most families catch on around U11 while the smarter ones at U10. https://youtu.be/DV7yx2y3TtY?si=d0U6448yzlADZ7gQ |
| SYC is so good that they’re playing up so as not to destroy everyone else. Except they aren’t good enough to play up without mixing in on-age kids into the team, thereby just making it a mixed age group team? Sounds fishy lol. |
| SYC “2012” team is the #1 “2012 team” in the state. Except it’s got 2011 kids playing on it. Simple as. |
| This is really your criticism of SYC. There are other issues with the program, but this seems like the least of the concerns. If it is developing players, then who cares. |
Except it isn't developing players. That's the problem. |