One benefit of wearing turf shoes especially during tournaments is that they don’t have to take it off when going to the parking lot, out to lunch, etc.

I sprained my ankle when I was a kid walking on the sidewalk wearing cleats.

Anonymous wrote:My kid wears turf shoes, unless the turf field is wet, in which case he wears cleats for traction. He had a bad slip on a wet turf field last season, and injured his knee, so no desire to repeat it.

I lookup what field she will play on and have her wear either cleats or turf shoes but also bring the other pair just in case. Some turf fields get pretty slippery even when it’s just a little wet.

I agree with another PP that shoes prices gets pretty expensive the older the kids get.

What I need to do is to get my DD to clean her cleats after playing on a wet/muddy grass field though. LOL

Coach here

Everything I say will of course be anecdotal.

Both my kid played from U8 into college and choose to wear only cleats vs turf shoes. They tried the turf shoes and didn't like their performance on the field.

Neither they, or any of my teams have had to play on the old, hard turf but those fields do exist in the NCR as far as I know. If it is a cost issue, you could probably get away with tennis shoes on that surface.

As far as overall health or causing damage all I can say is I have yet to see an injury I can directly attribute to wearing cleats on turf.

Cleats / boots are a very underrated part of the game. Really whatever your player finds more comfortable is what is best. As long as they are not slipping all over the field either is ok. If they are comfortable thats one less distraction they have. Its like most all other parts off the game about 50% psychological.

Anonymous wrote:And honestly, almost every kid on every other team seems to be wearing cleats on these turf fields as well.

Yeah. My DD is one of the few on her team that wears turf shoes. She said it’s much more comfortable when wearing it on turf fields.

As an alternative, you can get good insoles. I am not able to find one that doesn’t slip inside her cleats so I went with turf shoes instead.

My kid wears turf shoes, unless the turf field is wet, in which case he wears cleats for traction. He had a bad slip on a wet turf field last season, and injured his knee, so no desire to repeat it.

And honestly, almost every kid on every other team seems to be wearing cleats on these turf fields as well.

We are in men's sizes now, so it is more like spending $120 on turf shoes. But I am wondering why no other kid on the team wears turf shoes?

Anonymous wrote:OK, I really don't understand this. We practice/play almost exclusively on turf fields (maybe 1 or 2 games a season on a grass field). Every kid on this U15 lower level travel team wear regular cleats for everything. Is this bad?

This is what we are debating about. My take is that we all pay a lot of money for travel soccer in addition to travel and trainer costs, if applicable. Hence, spending an additional $50-$60 for a pair of turf shoes in addition to cleats might be wise.