Reply to Which NOVA U9 team plays most like Barcelona U9?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Third grade, really? Who cares.[/quote]

Anyone interested in seeing the U.S. be competitive in world soccer in 10 years should care.  The question is --- if NOVA is rich in talent relative to the rest of the United States, yet none of our U9 teams can hold a candle to Barcelona U9, why is that?

Do "we" in the U.S. have a better method?  Is there any age group at which we finally catch up to the real soccer powers of the world?  If not, why aren't we changing our approach?[/quote]

Even if everything else were equal, which it's not of course, why on earth would you expect a local travel club, drawing from a tiny subset of DC area residents to rival Barcelona's U9 team which presumably contains all the best talent from the entire Bareclona region?

If DCU had a U9 team, you might reasonably ask why it wasn't as good as the Barcelona team, if indeed it were not.  But DCU does not have a U9 team - and that is at least part of your answer.  Not just that there is no single team in this area which consolidates all of the talent in one place, but also that our local professional team makes no attempt to invest in the development of kids at that age, nor even much effort at any age.  In fact our local team probably actively hinders development by not only failinmg to provide adequate coaching and resources, but also preventing motivated kids from seeking such coaching elsewhere.

There are other reasons too - I place more credence in the cultural problem than "the best athletes play something else" problem.  For the parent who said "my kid plays with friends outside school", I would respond "Sure.  How often?".  In Spain the kids will play before school, mid-morning, at lunch time and after school.  When they go for play dates they will play soccer - and at the weekend they will play soccer.  They will play with their friends, with their families and with strangers.  The kids that are keen probably play 30-40 hours a week.  Not organized club training - just kicking a ball around because that is what they like doing.

That is not possible here.  Not least because most of our kids have to be driven to somewhere they can play instead of just running out to join the neighborhood game on whatever scrap of grass or bare earth it is always taking place.[/quote]

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