Anonymous wrote:Scenario - child has 2 offers. One for a less competitive team (local level), but will get to play a position he likes. One for a more competitive team (regional level), but is likely to be playing a position he doesn’t like as much.

Should this be a factor when deciding which team to play for? If the answer is “it depends” - please educate me on what it depends on!

The competitive team is better as long as he will get playing time there. The part that matters for development is playing time. Position doesn't matter. It's actually better to be able to play multiple positions.

If soccer is your first sport, or only sport, than go for more competition.

I'll dogpile onto this idea. The best thing to do is get your kid onto a team that has better players. They will get better by being around better players who are more serious and play faster. 2 years ago, DD played the full game of the position she wanted with a club very close to where we live. But the players were not skilled or very serious. --My DD literally got worse over the year. Everyone had low effort and poor passing skills and that transferred to my player. When we went for tryouts to a regional level team, my DD could barely keep ups with the pace of play. A former club mate, who was worse than her left a year earlier and she became so much better than my DD. That kid moved from a 3rd team to the 1st team in a year, we stayed 1 extra year and can now barely keep up with 2nd team kids.

Now we see 2nd team kids are chosen to go to much harder 1st team practices and they are getting so much better than the 2nd team kids because they around better/ faster players who are more serious.

My kid was the 3rd team star who could do 40 juggles. But now, on the 2nd team (different regional club), almost everyone juggles better than her. Being on the team forces her to get better.

It's all the harder practices that will have a bigger developmental impact verse starting in the position you want playing on the easier team in the easier league.

Anonymous wrote:According to a former pro player and current collegiate coach- always try to play for a competitive team in the highest league. Daily practices alongside of competitive teammates will keep your child more competitive.

This right here. I have two kids and both do much better when they practice alongside competitive teammates - a significant difference

Unless GK vs field player, I think you are focusing on the wrong thing. Positions change and kids should be playing multiple positions. Our coach changed our formation in the middle of a game last week. Most kids played more than 1 position. It would be strange if you could predict your child’s position prior to the season and actually be correct to the degree that they never play another position and it never changes during the season.

Anonymous wrote:The kid is 4 soon to be 5.

The kid is 4 soon to be 5.

What positions? We left a team because they were playing my son in goal and not on the field. But between field positions i cant imagine it matters that much. Is your son weaker at the position he prefers, so you think being on the lower team will give him more opportunities? That is an important consideration (and is what we did to get him more field time instead of goal). But how do you know where he will he played? If its a difference between striker and midfield, i think the practice aspect with the higher level team is more meaningful.

According to a former pro player and current collegiate coach- always try to play for a competitive team in the highest league. Daily practices alongside of competitive teammates will keep your child more competitive.

Anonymous wrote:It depends on the age of the child.
The younger, keep them more local and happy. Older, time to get more serious and get out of your comfort zone.

It depends on your goal to play in High School or not. HS Goal = more serious team develops the player more, they will practice with better teammates.

Kid's thoughts on teammates. Does he have fiends he wants to play with?

Learning that life and being part of a team is doing things to help the team and learning life lessons... but are they too young to understand those lessons?

Lastly, The Coach really matters... follow the best coach you can!

Seeking the ‘best’ coaches (in America) is a fallacy because parents are motivated by wins as sport is so pricey: paradox is this: ‘winning’ isn’t necessarily good for player development. (Technical training poor, tactics amateurish, too much pressing too early, too much kick and run…et al)

Major joke - hard to play for American end game: D1. Filled with European players!

Is this boy? Age? Are you tall? Big? Presuming you’re Dad posting here…

From my perspective (my child played since 5) soccer in America is all about optics - if he’s going to be big early go with RL - if it doesn’t look like he’s going to be big early save bucks on teams and if he adores the sport get him European trained (pro) trainer. Make him technical before 15.

He will then make varsity as a freshman.

It’s this bad in US soccer: there are no Messi’s here. More like hockey players in Gladwell’s Outliers.

Good luck!

It depends on the age of the child.
The younger, keep them more local and happy. Older, time to get more serious and get out of your comfort zone.

It depends on your goal to play in High School or not. HS Goal = more serious team develops the player more, they will practice with better teammates.

Kid's thoughts on teammates. Does he have fiends he wants to play with?

Learning that life and being part of a team is doing things to help the team and learning life lessons... but are they too young to understand those lessons?

Lastly, The Coach really matters... follow the best coach you can!

What do they want to do? Assuming you only allowed them to try out at clubs that work for your family, I think the choice should be theirs.
However, there’s one caveat depending on age. If one of the positions is GK, it’s generally not a good idea to specialize too early. Mine started playing 50% in goal at u10 but 100% at u11. I wish he had kept playing the field 50% until at least u12.

Age?

Scenario - child has 2 offers. One for a less competitive team (local level), but will get to play a position he likes. One for a more competitive team (regional level), but is likely to be playing a position he doesn’t like as much.

Should this be a factor when deciding which team to play for? If the answer is “it depends” - please educate me on what it depends on!