Anonymous wrote:8 year olds are already traveling? Shouldn’t this age be focused on general skills development and fun. We are in a different sport and y8 is the youngest category for any tournaments, but kids don’t start traveling out of state until 12 at the very least.

They called travel teams, but at U9, they are mostly play local teams. The furthest we did is one hour drive.

Alexandria U9 practice at Ben Brenman Park, which is really close to 395 and 495.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have multiple kids in various sports and while our oldest is doing well and enjoying his travel soccer team, our younger son is on a U9 team in the same club and having a not-so-great experience. He thrives based on encouragement and so far, the coaching has been extremely impersonal. It’s also clear that the coach plays favorites, but we expected that. We don’t put too much stake in it all at this age and don’t need anything super intense, but also recognize that these are formative years in a sport that he considers his favorite. Are there any U9 travel teams in the area you’ve had a positive experience with? A coach that wants to actually form a relationship and help the kids grow without too many politics?

Most clubs' coaches at younger age levels don't age up with the kids, so if you want a team that might offer a chance to build a long-term relationship with the coach (and his teammates), you might need to seek out parent-led travel teams and/or you should beging asking clubs about the longevity of their coaching staff and how long coaches stay with their groups (e.g. 1 year, 2, 3, until they graduate).

Yes, and we know ours won’t age up with our son, so we can always just suck it up and get through this year. But coming off of a year off from soccer due to Covid, I quickly saw my son’s excitement to play turn into disappointment in that his coach just doesn’t seem to connect to the boys. So if we could potentially switch to a new team that he actually enjoys, I think it could make a difference for him. Doesn’t need to be a relationship so to speak, just a rapport really where he’d feel engaged.

Many young coaches and/or coaches who don't have children of their own and are paid simply lack many of these relationship skills because they don't know what it's like for young kids the way parents do. I'm not saying the coach then has to be a parent of one of the kids on the team, but if the coach has had children of their own/parented children the age of your kid, often they simply better understand how to communicate with children of those ages.

That’s asinine. You may as well say no one should be a teach if they don’t have kids. Plus there are plenty of crappy parents, they didn’t magically become great at working with kids because they popped out a kid or got some lady pregnant. There are good coaches and bad coaches - some go on to have kids, some don’t. Maybe having a child changes their coaching for the better, maybe sleepless nights and stretched finances make them more irritable or only in it for the extra paycheck.

Your bigger clubs with a longer history of development run a higher probability of having good coaches at any given age. Of course, you should attend some trainings and matches to confirm for yourself as there will be outliers. You may find a coach at McLean/Arlington/Alexandria that isn’t a good fit or isn’t a good coach. You might find a unicorn at Vienna/Reston/Villareal or another smaller club who is a good coach. Look at whether they provide any real instruction and feedback, see how the players play. Good luck, it sucks. Every training session and match run by a terrible coach is pure hell, especially knowing you are paying a ton of money for it.

Anonymous wrote:Sadly, most of the advice you'll get on here is biased and unreliable. None of the area clubs have consistent coaching across the club. You really have no choice but to do your own research. Make a list of local clubs within range and go watch them yourself to see what the coach and environment is like in your son's age group and make your selection based on that. Winning and competition level are nowhere near as important at that age as the environment the coach creates. My daughter who plays D1 now was with parent coaches until U11.

Totally false. How on earth would you know about the consistency of every clubs younger teams on both boy and girls side? Some clubs have had the same coaching progression in place at these ages for the past five years and teach the same principles.

Anonymous wrote:8 year olds are already traveling? Shouldn’t this age be focused on general skills development and fun. We are in a different sport and y8 is the youngest category for any tournaments, but kids don’t start traveling out of state until 12 at the very least.

And they don't at U9 in travel soccer either. Stop clutching your pearls.

Anonymous wrote:Agree. Winning doesn't matter AT ALL in the younger ages. Teams that win are often the ones that rely on speed and strength. Some of those teams have to start recruiting better trained kids at the older ages or they start to use better coaches at the older ages.

And then the rich get richer while the poor get poorer, meaning the teams that actually do a better job preparing young players to play without relying on speed and strength may be mediocre at best at the younger ages, then their best players out of that pool leave/get recruited to these other "winning" clubs that do a poorer job preparing their young players to play. Also known as the BRYC conundrum.

8 year olds are already traveling? Shouldn’t this age be focused on general skills development and fun. We are in a different sport and y8 is the youngest category for any tournaments, but kids don’t start traveling out of state until 12 at the very least.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have multiple kids in various sports and while our oldest is doing well and enjoying his travel soccer team, our younger son is on a U9 team in the same club and having a not-so-great experience. He thrives based on encouragement and so far, the coaching has been extremely impersonal. It’s also clear that the coach plays favorites, but we expected that. We don’t put too much stake in it all at this age and don’t need anything super intense, but also recognize that these are formative years in a sport that he considers his favorite. Are there any U9 travel teams in the area you’ve had a positive experience with? A coach that wants to actually form a relationship and help the kids grow without too many politics?

Most clubs' coaches at younger age levels don't age up with the kids, so if you want a team that might offer a chance to build a long-term relationship with the coach (and his teammates), you might need to seek out parent-led travel teams and/or you should beging asking clubs about the longevity of their coaching staff and how long coaches stay with their groups (e.g. 1 year, 2, 3, until they graduate).

Yes, and we know ours won’t age up with our son, so we can always just suck it up and get through this year. But coming off of a year off from soccer due to Covid, I quickly saw my son’s excitement to play turn into disappointment in that his coach just doesn’t seem to connect to the boys. So if we could potentially switch to a new team that he actually enjoys, I think it could make a difference for him. Doesn’t need to be a relationship so to speak, just a rapport really where he’d feel engaged.

Many young coaches and/or coaches who don't have children of their own and are paid simply lack many of these relationship skills because they don't know what it's like for young kids the way parents do. I'm not saying the coach then has to be a parent of one of the kids on the team, but if the coach has had children of their own/parented children the age of your kid, often they simply better understand how to communicate with children of those ages.

Agree. Winning doesn't matter AT ALL in the younger ages. Teams that win are often the ones that rely on speed and strength. Some of those teams have to start recruiting better trained kids at the older ages or they start to use better coaches at the older ages.

Anonymous wrote:Sadly, most of the advice you'll get on here is biased and unreliable. None of the area clubs have consistent coaching across the club. You really have no choice but to do your own research. Make a list of local clubs within range and go watch them yourself to see what the coach and environment is like in your son's age group and make your selection based on that. Winning and competition level are nowhere near as important at that age as the environment the coach creates. My daughter who plays D1 now was with parent coaches until U11.

So is yournsolutuon to do rec or to have a parent run travel team in the younger ages?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sadly, most of the advice you'll get on here is biased and unreliable. None of the area clubs have consistent coaching across the club. You really have no choice but to do your own research. Make a list of local clubs within range and go watch them yourself to see what the coach and environment is like in your son's age group and make your selection based on that. Winning and competition level are nowhere near as important at that age as the environment the coach creates. My daughter who plays D1 now was with parent coaches until U11.

Definitely agree with this. I'll add that kick-and-run tends to lead to winning more at younger ages, but its terrible for development. Go see some practices, get a feel for the team and coach, stay local if you can, prioritize enjoyment of the game. After that, ignore everything you read on DCUM and pick the club that that feels like the best fit for your kid.

Then what are you doing here?

Anonymous wrote:Sadly, most of the advice you'll get on here is biased and unreliable. None of the area clubs have consistent coaching across the club. You really have no choice but to do your own research. Make a list of local clubs within range and go watch them yourself to see what the coach and environment is like in your son's age group and make your selection based on that. Winning and competition level are nowhere near as important at that age as the environment the coach creates. My daughter who plays D1 now was with parent coaches until U11.

Definitely agree with this. I'll add that kick-and-run tends to lead to winning more at younger ages, but its terrible for development. Go see some practices, get a feel for the team and coach, stay local if you can, prioritize enjoyment of the game. After that, ignore everything you read on DCUM and pick the club that that feels like the best fit for your kid.

Sadly, most of the advice you'll get on here is biased and unreliable. None of the area clubs have consistent coaching across the club. You really have no choice but to do your own research. Make a list of local clubs within range and go watch them yourself to see what the coach and environment is like in your son's age group and make your selection based on that. Winning and competition level are nowhere near as important at that age as the environment the coach creates. My daughter who plays D1 now was with parent coaches until U11.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Not sure if there were reasons you avoided VYS initially but my son is on the U9 team with VYS and we all love it. The coach (who also teaches U10) is great and the group of kids is wonderful. They haven’t won a lot of games yet but my son is having so much fun that he doesn’t seem to care.

Is this post fr?

Why wouldn’t it be? Is it so difficult to believe that kids can have fun playing soccer even if they haven’t “won a lot of games” less than 1 month into the season?

Like other clubs, Vienna fields multiple teams at the U9 and U10 age groups. Their teams are competitive with the other teams in the area. We’ve had good experiences with the coaches at that age level.

What is difficult to believe is that the parent seems OK with it. If your DC team is constantly losing, and they are in the appropriate bracket, doesn't that say more about the coaching than the players? The fact the parent is ok with it because the kid is "having fun" bothers me. I guess it doesn't bother others as well.

The kids are 8 years old. I promise you they will never develop as players if their coach screams at them, their teammates are jerks, their parents are overly competitive, and they aren't having fun. Isn't the season 3 games old? And they have probably been practicing together for 6 weeks? I'm not familiar with that team, but its likely they will win some games.

Anonymous wrote:If you can make it to Alexandria, do it. However, that drive from Vienna to Simpson, if that's where they are practicing, could be brutal. We only last a year and had to find something closer. If they are Ben Brenman, that helps. Another thought...don't do PAC. It's a slow train to nowhere. Each year, maybe one kid is good enough to move to a top team at another club. There is no better development there than anywhere else.

U9 and u10 practice at Brenman, on Tues/Thur/Fri. U9 practice starts at 430pm, which can be tough with work schedules etc