If you think your child may be moved down did your DD's coach talk to you or to her?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To coach at 8:41: can you explain to us clueless parents at the U10 and U11 ages what should happen with smaller and weaker kids who may be good technically but need to grow? What I see is the bigger kids getting more playing time immediately; which gives them more confidence and more game awareness; and then the gap just increases. It is almost like we say if you are young and small for that year, don’t bother, even if you have good potential. Because by the time DS is 12 or 13, they have lost so many chances to grow they will never catch up. Is this accurate or am I imagining it?

Sure. This is similar to the age group I have. For me personally, the size won't affect playing time much on its own. The problem is when a player is small and plays like they're scared of everyone. All players are capable of giving 100% and being aggressive. But for other coaches, this might be different as others have said.

And yes - the whole size thing does create a gap if your club assigns poor coaches to their B/C/D teams (where smaller kids end up). Something that needs to be looked at in this country.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Thank you, PP. That is what I am thinking as well. When a U11 team is up 8:1 and the coach still doesn’t switch out the starting striker, that to me is a problem. I see a lot of that at the 9, 10, 11 ages. It is why we have left a large club.

At u11 all players should rotate through all positions.

[Anonymous]

My kid and almost half of the team got moved down. Coach didn't talk to us or the kids.

We learned about it when we received the new Offer email for the following year.

No explanations. Thanks SYC!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid and almost half of the team got moved down. Coach didn't talk to us or the kids.

We learned about it when we received the new Offer email for the following year.

No explanations. Thanks SYC!

Gotta make room for the outside kids they recruit- how else are they going to win?

[Anonymous]

My kid and almost half of the team got moved down. Coach didn't talk to us or the kids.

We learned about it when we received the new Offer email for the following year.

No explanations. Thanks SYC!


Gotta make room for the outside kids they recruit- how else are they going to win?

I am sorry that happened to your kid. I wonder if they had a lot of really talented kids trying out? My son's friend is going to SYC this year and he is a really good.

[Anonymous]

Sure. This is similar to the age group I have. For me personally, the size won't affect playing time much on its own. The problem is when a player is small and plays like they're scared of everyone.

I could not agree more. OP, my son is really tiny (both short and slight), but has done well for himself, even though he doesn't have an inherently high aggression level on the field. What has helped is focus on his physical fitness outside of practice (he is a U12 now) and working with a private trainer with another kid who is more aggressive (but weaker technical skills). They work together great, because they have to address their own weaknesses and their opponent's strengths.

[Anonymous]

DS is aggressive and fast but goes flying if hitting some of the larger kids. It’s just physics. But these answers do confirm our choice to move on.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My kid and almost half of the team got moved down. Coach didn't talk to us or the kids.

We learned about it when we received the new Offer email for the following year.

No explanations. Thanks SYC!

What age is this? Big influx of new players?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DS is aggressive and fast but goes flying if hitting some of the larger kids. It’s just physics. But these answers do confirm our choice to move on.

Not necessarily. My younger son, just turned 13 is on track for a very late growth spurt---skinny, skinny ---can see his ribs and short. That kid never goes down and will come out of a scrum of 4 or 5 big players with the ball at his feet. He can shield effectively well. Playing with his older brother (U16) who also had a late growth spurt--but now almost 6 feet tall helped a lot with that.

The striker on my older son's team who is the same height and build as my son is on the ground literally every.single.play. It's not his size as he is as big or bigger than most of the backs he's up against.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:DS is aggressive and fast but goes flying if hitting some of the larger kids. It’s just physics. But these answers do confirm our choice to move on.

Not necessarily. My younger son, just turned 13 is on track for a very late growth spurt---skinny, skinny ---can see his ribs and short. That kid never goes down and will come out of a scrum of 4 or 5 big players with the ball at his feet. He can shield effectively well. Playing with his older brother (U16) who also had a late growth spurt--but now almost 6 feet tall helped a lot with that.

The striker on my older son's team who is the same height and build as my son is on the ground literally every.single.play. It's not his size as he is as big or bigger than most of the backs he's up against.

Oh--but, yes, a lot of first teams at clubs look primarily at size. We have blatantly been told that they will develop the smaller/haven't grown yet kids on 2nd team before moving them up. You do need to shop around to find clubs that will keep them at the level of play they need. For us, that meant leaving and spending U11-U13 somewhere else where he was able to play on a first team and in the same premier tournaments/leagues/state cup, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid and almost half of the team got moved down. Coach didn't talk to us or the kids.

We learned about it when we received the new Offer email for the following year.

No explanations. Thanks SYC!

What age is this? Big influx of new players?

From what I hear all U13 and up on the boys side to make room for new MLS Next kids. Unfortunately, most of those new kids will just be part-time players. No real commitment to the Club.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid and almost half of the team got moved down. Coach didn't talk to us or the kids.

We learned about it when we received the new Offer email for the following year.

No explanations. Thanks SYC!

What age is this? Big influx of new players?

From what I hear all U13 and up on the boys side to make room for new MLS Next kids. Unfortunately, most of those new kids will just be part-time players. No real commitment to the Club.

it's not like SYC didn't know what they were doing when they signed up for MLS next

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid and almost half of the team got moved down. Coach didn't talk to us or the kids.

We learned about it when we received the new Offer email for the following year.

No explanations. Thanks SYC!

What age is this? Big influx of new players?

From what I hear all U13 and up on the boys side to make room for new MLS Next kids. Unfortunately, most of those new kids will just be part-time players. No real commitment to the Club.

Where are the new players coming from? Arlington?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kid and almost half of the team got moved down. Coach didn't talk to us or the kids.

We learned about it when we received the new Offer email for the following year.

No explanations. Thanks SYC!

What age is this? Big influx of new players?

From what I hear all U13 and up on the boys side to make room for new MLS Next kids. Unfortunately, most of those new kids will just be part-time players. No real commitment to the Club.

Haha, No real commitment. It sounds like those players are from the "Bolivian League"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No heads up for us, but we asked the coach about the reasons for the decision to move my DS to a lower level team. Apparently the club needed to add a number of outside players from the tryouts so some kids were moved down even though they did well on the field throughout the season (DS was a regular starter with plenty of playing time and was rarely subbed out). Some clubs hope that if they let the player know at the latest possible moment, the player is more likely to agree to move down to a lower team within the club, because the roster spots are getting filled by big clubs at around the same time and it is harder to secure a spot elsewhere. My DS is adamant that he wants move to a different club even though the coach hinted that he will likely have an opportunity to move back up next year. DS insists that we reject the offer and does not even want to wait for an offer from another club before we do it.

Sorry to hear what happened to your ds. I think he made a good choice.