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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Are you saying that VDA, Richmond, and Arlington were only offered MLS Next for u13-14?

My understanding was that all age groups were offered to original DA teams. BSC and Baltimore have all age groups represented.  Look at the MLS Next teams for u15 and up, it’s all former DA clubs.

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Well DC United was moving out to Va. I heard DC United will have their own youth program ..so why offer anything to a club that could be seen as competition?[/quote]

DCU has always had their own youth program. That is not new with the move to VA. Three years ago DCU had a u12 team even. Arlington was only a few miles away and had a DA program.  Competition is not new for DCU.

Again, my understanding was all of the former DA clubs were invited to join MLS Next, but for whatever reason, the VA clubs decided to join ECNL instead.[/quote]

In the last DA boys season, there were two tiers of DA teams. This was done to appease the MLS clubs, who grew tired of beating the bottom half of DA by 5+ goals every game. The only local DA teams that were not affiliated with a MLS club, but that were invited into that top tier DA league,
were Baltimore Armour and Bethesda. When DA collapsed, the MLS Next teams were basically the same as the former top tier DA teams. That’s why BA and BSC were invited to join. The other lower tier DA teams were left to figure things out on their own, and most reluctantly accepted the invitation from ECNL.  [/quote]

I don't think this is correct - or at least not entirely correct - for several reasons.

1.  The tier system was only for the DA cup, not for the regular league play - and it was not intended to be a permanent structure - the suggestion was that teams could mopve based on results.

2.  There appear to be clubs which are full members of MLS Next with all age groups which were not in the top tier of the DA cup.  PA Classics is one example, but there are others.

3.  It doesn't match what we - as Arlington parents - were told by the club.  Nor does it match what MLS Next said publicly.

Nevertheless Arlington was in an odd situation.  They had only the junior teams as part of the DA, and had just been awarded the U16/17 age group for the following year as a consequence of the coaching and performance of the junior teams (so they would have had 4 of the 5 possible age groups).  Consequently it would have been possible to argue that they did not automatically qualify under the public MLS Next policy of offering all existing DA clubs membership in MLS Next.

In addition it may well be that DC United did not want to see Arlington as a full member of MLS.  It certainly appears that they are not offering this to SYC/Alexandria/Achilles.  It looks much more like DCU want other clubs to develop kids that will move to DCU at U15.  And it is certainly true that DCU have repeatedly made offers to a number of Arlington kids who have declined to take them up.  So perhaps DCU did block Arlington being offered full membership and Arlington chose not to expose the exact details to parents regarding what was and wasn't offered.

That said, both Richmond and VDA would absolutely have qualified for full membership, as would a large number of the Carolina teams which elected to go to ECNL.  And they chose not to joing MLS Next.  So it is entirely possible that Arlington was offered full membership and elected not to take it for the reasons they stated at the time.

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