Ihatedumbsoccerparents wrote:Anyone on this board have first hand experience on any other umbrella situations…VDA, Brave, Union? I’m new to NOVA and don’t know the history of those clubs. Obviously Loudoun is the stronger club of the 3 for NVA no offense meant to any club. Did any other situation have a similar feel of the power/rankings dynamic as these 3?

What would you like to know?
1. VDA was the first of the alliances to form quite a few years back. Then Union (McLean/SYC) a couple of years ago, then Brave, and now this Loudoun thing.
2. Union has by far the longest and best reputation for college placement of girls at least. VDA is next, then Loudoun and Brave. YMMV. Boys are a different story.
3. Loudoun is the largest alliance, Brave and Union are probably the smallest. I haven't counted, this is just my sense.
4. In the Union alliance, a handful of SYC girls make the ECNL ranks, but the teams are run by McLean for the most part.

Blutarski wrote:

awesomepossum wrote:ECNL told McLean and BRYC to merge to become Union and Brave and if you look at the branding for Alliance I assume they told Loudoun to do this merger. They’ve voiced they don’t want to add new teams in Northern Virginia and the Mid Atlantic conference is huge. It does allow them to get more Clubs involved in ECNL in some form. It might help Loudoun a little but mostly it makes Great Falls and Valor part of the ECNL umbrella in some form. That’s my take…

Nonsense.
1. ECNL has no interest in directing club mergers. Alliance or no alliance, the best female players gravitate to ECNL anyway. It's been that way as long as ECNL has been around.
2. Neither Valor nor GFR were even close to qualifying for ECNL membership. For them, this is a weak attempt to claim they are keeping their best girls in the system, however based on the way that similar alliances work, they will not have much of a part in running the ECNL teams.
3. VA Union is an alliance between McLean and SYC. BRYC is not involved. There are/were different motivations for this alliance than the Loudoun alliance.
4. For all 3 clubs, this may allows control of more field space and leverage with county resources.

Great point on number 2. There’s usually one club within alliances/mergers/unions where they have more control over what’s occurring on the ECNL teams.

awesomepossum wrote:ECNL told McLean and BRYC to merge to become Union and Brave and if you look at the branding for Alliance I assume they told Loudoun to do this merger. They’ve voiced they don’t want to add new teams in Northern Virginia and the Mid Atlantic conference is huge. It does allow them to get more Clubs involved in ECNL in some form. It might help Loudoun a little but mostly it makes Great Falls and Valor part of the ECNL umbrella in some form. That’s my take…

Nonsense.
1. ECNL has no interest in directing club mergers. Alliance or no alliance, the best female players gravitate to ECNL anyway. It's been that way as long as ECNL has been around.
2. Neither Valor nor GFR were even close to qualifying for ECNL membership. For them, this is a weak attempt to claim they are keeping their best girls in the system, however based on the way that similar alliances work, they will not have much of a part in running the ECNL teams.
3. VA Union is an alliance between McLean and SYC. BRYC is not involved. There are/were different/additional motivations for this alliance than the Loudoun alliance.
4. For all 3 clubs, this may allows control of more field space and leverage with county resources.

It’s not a dilution for the national league but for the regional league it might affect the clubs RL teams depending on their depth and player quality. Which for example like I previously mentioned on the VDA partnership. VSA typically is fine after they send players up to VDA and as of late with PWSI they have a difficult time fielding teams after U12. PWSI hasn’t even fielded a full 2009 roster the past two seasons for RL play.

I don’t see how this diluted anything. Still have the same number of ECNL teams and players in the area. Assuming ECNL was already pulling the best players from the region, isn’t it just the same players under a different team name?

Really just depends on how they handle the model of the umbrella.

This could further dilute the competition level in the regional league. If you look at some of the umbrella teams like PWSI for example, they tend to fall off hard once ECNL kicks in at U13 on their girls side. They seem to struggle to assemble teams once they lose some players to ECNL at U13. On the other hand their sister club VSA seems to have more consistency but perhaps their numbers are larger than PWSI.

Overall its probably not a bad situation being that there is now another tier for higher level players within those clubs. How it plays out will be up to the three clubs and how they manage the teams and players leading up to those teams.

Anyone on this board have first hand experience on any other umbrella situations…VDA, Brave, Union? I’m new to NOVA and don’t know the history of those clubs. Obviously Loudoun is the stronger club of the 3 for NVA no offense meant to any club. Did any other situation have a similar feel of the power/rankings dynamic as these 3?

I read VDA is a combination of 3 clubs, was this recent is that one similar?

I would just be surprised that all of this happens and 2-5 players from the non ECNL teams don’t make the main team just for optics. Can’t really call it an Alliance if none of the other clubs adds players to Loudoun ECNL team…that would just be called Loudoun ECNL.

It will affect Loudoun teams the most now, but I think the vision is a stronger pipeline for the future kids still in academy age soccer. Now those kids don’t have to leave their smaller club if they have the talent for ECNL…that way ECNL grows stronger…not by adding more teams….we all have seen more teams dilute leagues before……but by making their existing teams more talented..it’s a pretty smart business model IMO

soccer_dc wrote:What does this mean for existing Loudoun ECNL players? will they need to try out to make this new team?

Of course. Just like they do every Spring.

What does this mean for existing Loudoun ECNL players? will they need to try out to make this new team?

ECNL told McLean and BRYC to merge to become Union and Brave and if you look at the branding for Alliance I assume they told Loudoun to do this merger. They’ve voiced they don’t want to add new teams in Northern Virginia and the Mid Atlantic conference is huge. It does allow them to get more Clubs involved in ECNL in some form. It might help Loudoun a little but mostly it makes Great Falls and Valor part of the ECNL umbrella in some form. That’s my take…

Ihatedumbsoccerparents wrote:

SDC wrote:So it was FOMO?

How does this help Loudoun? I see how it can help Valor and GF....

Simple, Loudoun is a powerhouse now they have players from 2 other clubs to help them be even stronger. Plus starting a new club it’s easier to trim the fat and add more muscle to the line up

My 2 cents

The other clubs would need to have the talent to displace existing for that to happen. And Loudoun already has a huge pipeline so I don't see this helping in any way....

SDC wrote:So it was FOMO?

How does this help Loudoun? I see how it can help Valor and GF....

Simple, Loudoun is a powerhouse now they have players from 2 other clubs to help them be even stronger. Plus starting a new club it’s easier to trim the fat and add more muscle to the line up

My 2 cents

So it was FOMO?

How does this help Loudoun? I see how it can help Valor and GF....

Because everyone else was doing it

VDA - PWSI, VSA, and Herndon

Virginia Union - Mclean and SYC

Fairfax BRAVE - BRYC and Vienna

Richmond United - Kickers and Strikers

Why?