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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]My DS has loved soccer since he was small. He would play (still does play) outside for hours on his own. He is constantly walking around the house with a soccer ball attached to his foot. He watches both US and European soccer all the time.

He's not one of the fastest or biggest kids. He was always on one of the lower teams when he was younger. But we were fortunate with his coaches, and in his younger years his third- and fourth-team coaches were young and dynamic coaches who really helped DS and his teammates. The coaches were great: they'd grown up playing and learning a dynamic style of playing that they passed on to their team.

Last year DS's coach got an offer to coach a top-level team at a club. Good career-wise for the coach, but sad for my DS. Because there was so much change going on, we thought it might be time to try out for one of the more competitive teams at one of the local clubs. He made it on fairly easily. The coach said that he had unusually good soccer sense for his age (U12). This club has a DA team, and he's playing on the NPL team one level down from the DA team.

This team as a whole is at a higher-level, there's no question. DS has gone from being a bench player to starting within a season. But here's the thing: I don't think DS is learning nearly as much as he used to learn, and I don't think he's having as much fun. I feel like he's plateaued on skills acquisition whereas before, I could just see him absorbing more and more, even though this team takes up more time. Also, and more worrying for me, he doesn't seem to have as much joy in it. I don't really care if he plays in college (DS really wants to play in college). I want him to keep playing through high school because I think high school athletics are valuable. I am worried he's just going to burn out, though. He is talking about playing DA, but I've watched the DA team and I don't think it's necessarily a good idea.

We're thinking about taking him down a level and letting him have individual coaching with the coaches he loved (who like the idea). But I've heard other coaches/parents say that at U13, if you pull a kid down to anything under NPL, they won't get back to NPL or DA levels again. I think that seems kind of silly but I don't know much about this world.

DS is ambivalent. He doesn't love his current team but he loves soccer and wants to play at a competitive level. He seemed pretty relieved, though, when I told him that he could move down and we'd support it, and I think at some level he really likes the idea. He's mentioned it multiple times to me since I raised it.

Have any of you ever done this? Is moving down really such a dramatic move?
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Talk about over reaction. It is a new team, new coach and new club and only October. Chill out. If he isn’t complaining you shouldn’t be. [/quote]

OP here. This is his second season with the team. The switch was last year, not this year.[/quote]

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