Anonymous wrote:Unless your kid is over-the-top fantastic, I would skip the top clubs that will consider your kid part of a revenue team and never give them the opportunity to move up. Go to a club that works to develop all players, moves kids up to play and sometimes practice with the top team if they are on the second team, and doesn't cost an arm and a leg

How do we know which club is developing players?
What does that look like?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What places are better?

Ignore that guy. Always one.

In no order:

HP Elite
Futstars
Golden Boot
False8
Next Star
Ballerz Academy
Coerver

All have programs. Try for yourself, evaluate and see what works. For what it is worth, the best technical players my DC has played against (we are still Pre MLS Next/GA/ECNL age groups) play ALOT of futsal and play with In10sity and False8.

The HP Elite poster has a point. A lot of these groups (mentioned above), group the kids by ability, and if you are in the lower ability group, you are not receiving the same level of service as the upper group. We have seen that at HP Elite, Next Star, Capstone and False8 personally. They all have their returning favorite All-Star skilled players groups and they also have kids they just don't push, coach or motivate as much. If your kid is already in the best grouping, you probably won't notice the quality difference to the lower skill-group, even within the same session.

But yes, the families who do all these extra training sessions (regardless of which group you do attend), including summer & winter futsal, usually result in the kid's confidence and skill level growing. Most travel Coaches notice the 'new skill moves' because they don't teach that stuff in team practices much or at all. -So, it is still a very valid point, if you want your kid to stand out at tryouts...it is good to learn the new 'highlight reel' skill moves and use them, especially at tryouts.

Anonymous wrote:The clubs should evaluate their current players at the regular practices and hold tryouts for new players.

I personally hate all the random kids showing up to practice all year. Its bad for team dynamics but i totally underdtand the motivation.

Who cares what you think. Are you the coach? No, so sit back down and shut your mouth.

Op here. Some great additions. Yea it was recess style for older kids and it’s just such a waste. Kids who are great at passing will never be noticed in a field of poor players. The showboats move up but we know they can’t play in a real game… some 5 minute game players mixed in. You get the idea. Just… why bother?!

Anonymous wrote:The clubs should evaluate their current players at the regular practices and hold tryouts for new players.

I personally hate all the random kids showing up to practice all year. Its bad for team dynamics but i totally underdtand the motivation.

This is the problem. On one hand, it sucks for the current team to have randoms at their practice all the time. On the other hand, new kids have to do this to have a fair chance to make the team. Maybe if clubs didn't let outside kids attend practices, the general tryout would mean more. Or maybe only evaluate kids in a team practice, limited to 1-2 outside kids at any single practice, and get rid of general tryouts. They should probably do away with one or the other.

The clubs should evaluate their current players at the regular practices and hold tryouts for new players.

I personally hate all the random kids showing up to practice all year. Its bad for team dynamics but i totally underdtand the motivation.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Unless your kid is over-the-top fantastic, I would skip the top clubs that will consider your kid part of a revenue team and never give them the opportunity to move up. Go to a club that works to develop all players, moves kids up to play and sometimes practice with the top team if they are on the second team, and doesn't cost an arm and a leg

This. Life is too short. It's unnecessary stress. Top clubs work for the over-the-top fantastic players no doubt. Better options out there for everyone else.

That's the issue though. What if your kid is straddling those two categories? It's not always such a simple equation.

Anonymous wrote:Unless your kid is over-the-top fantastic, I would skip the top clubs that will consider your kid part of a revenue team and never give them the opportunity to move up. Go to a club that works to develop all players, moves kids up to play and sometimes practice with the top team if they are on the second team, and doesn't cost an arm and a leg

This. Life is too short. It's unnecessary stress. Top clubs work for the over-the-top fantastic players no doubt. Better options out there for everyone else.

Anonymous wrote:How else do you observe a 100 kids trying out?

We went to a tryout at Vienna last year that had something like 150 boys there. I thought they did a good job. If I recall correctly they started with some 1v1's and 2v2's, then some small sided scrimmages. But they had a lot of field space to break all the kids up into small groups... like 2 full fields I think. And lots of coaches there evaluating.

Anonymous wrote:Everyone has to start somewhere. SYC is a great place that develop players. Just look at their recent story. Players who were on their 4th team moved up to their top MLS Next team.

HAHAHAHA. Players musta had a growth spurt. Unless you are 5’10+ with a cannon for a leg, they aren’t going anywhere. SYC sucks for developing players.

They have no true skills. Idiotic parents think they are the best. They play kickball.

Unless your kid is over-the-top fantastic, I would skip the top clubs that will consider your kid part of a revenue team and never give them the opportunity to move up. Go to a club that works to develop all players, moves kids up to play and sometimes practice with the top team if they are on the second team, and doesn't cost an arm and a leg

How else do you observe a 100 kids trying out?

right. which is why its a disservice to everyone including current players when clubs run the recess style soccer that don't really observe much of anything.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The issue with tryouts is each club does it differently. All clubs have their set teams already, they're just looking for 1-5 more kids and that's it. When you don't see coaches looking at a game/group that's because they are evaluating the kids they want to look at. They've either already evaluated the kids in the side game or they don't care.

I prefer tryouts to include technical skill section, then 1v1, then 2-4v2-4, then small scrimmages. This way each player gets seem a good amount. During scrimmages not everyone gets a chance on the ball much so they can't be evaluated.

This . Scrimmages that have current players and bunch of newbies are just stupid. Unless your kid is aggressive and has an attitude, nobody will notice. And unfortunately those are not the best qualities in a player. The tryouts we attended had so many kids on the field, it was crazy. It was basically a recess style soccer.

Yup looked like little kid bunch ball. I was shocked my kid actually called for the ball during the side games. I did notice an uber aggressive kid was moved to play with one of the higher teams. The technical and passing skills aren’t there but the kid can boot the ball well and is quite able to play physically. That does stand out in these small games.

Anonymous wrote:The issue with tryouts is each club does it differently. All clubs have their set teams already, they're just looking for 1-5 more kids and that's it. When you don't see coaches looking at a game/group that's because they are evaluating the kids they want to look at. They've either already evaluated the kids in the side game or they don't care.

I prefer tryouts to include technical skill section, then 1v1, then 2-4v2-4, then small scrimmages. This way each player gets seem a good amount. During scrimmages not everyone gets a chance on the ball much so they can't be evaluated.

This . Scrimmages that have current players and bunch of newbies are just stupid. Unless your kid is aggressive and has an attitude, nobody will notice. And unfortunately those are not the best qualities in a player. The tryouts we attended had so many kids on the field, it was crazy. It was basically a recess style soccer.