Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With VYS coaches at the helm of BRAVE, they play direct, transition ball which is the opposite of BRYC possession ball and positioning that is taught. No wonder there is confusion when merging players and I can't see how it's going to benefit talented BRYC players whose only job will be to look mediocre and play it directly to the fast forward(s).

Certainly talented BRYC players get recruited by other clubs but why can't those clubs develop their own talent/promote from within? They want to profit from the work of others who have developed these players for them.

The play is rather direct but seems to progress over the years. Not sure how many BRYC girls are on the ‘08 and younger rosters. I believe not a single one on 2011.

I would say talented girls from any club get recruited not just the special BRYC ones. Let’s stop pretending the clubs are the biggest reason for development. It largely falls on the individual and the work they put in on their own.

How do you play direct when OP says they only play with one striker? 5 central midfielders leads me to believe it’s not a confusion issue on possession vs direct but confusion on the formation. There must be some wide, left, right midfielders?

Most teams around here that I’ve seen use 5 Midfielders and a back 4 are just parking the bus…And when they gain possession they are just pinging it long in the general direction of the striker and hoping for a fluke goal. Definitely have seen some BRAVE teams play that way.

This sounds terrible. I can see this if you have a lead to preserve in the final minutes but to play like this all of the time is criminal. Young players will never develop doing this. How is Brave winning with this style of play?

It is terrible and you are absolutely right that it does zero for the players long term…It just makes the results more palatable. BRAVE teams have a combined 28 wins in 96 matches, so there is a lot more losing going on than winning.

Is that the girls side or both? What about Union, Arlington, NVA and VDA? How many wins on their girls side in comparison?

No one is saying Brave is the best around, at least I think, but it seems that some of the teams have outperformed expectations.

And if their terrible strategy does not develop players then surely by U16 (2008) these other teams with their superior styles should be running circles around these undeveloped girls right? Or do these other clubs need one more year to prove they develop (recruit) the best?

If you strictly want to look at points per game from U13-U19 on the girls side through the current year, it would look like this... Brave still cradled at the bottom.

1. NVA - 1.95
2. Union - 1.73
3. VDA - 1.62
4. ARL - 1.23
5. Brave - 1.20

"points"?
In soccer?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. The roadkill comment is a bit harsh as there is talent on the team. There’s just no chance to show it. Team plays a 4-5-1 with 5 central midfielders. No one wide of the hash marks on offense. Half the team plays direct long ball to the one striker who if she’s lucky to get the ball is surrounded by 4 defenders. Coach says never to pass back so then the striker tries to take on the 4 defenders and ultimately loses the ball. The other half of the team tries to play possession passing. But with 5 central midfielders they are all passing to players standing 10 feet from each other. On defense, when the opponent builds out of the back through their full back, there’s no wide players in the offense or midfield. So the 5 central midfielders and our defensive full back all look at each other to figure out who’s supposed to step up. Every game and every time it’s a different player or any many cases no one.

My point is that the season is almost over and DD or team should be coached on basic things like what do we do when we have the ball, who is supposed to guard players on the other team. During games give players instructions on how to adjust.

Apparently this team had some success last year. We arrived to learn that literally everyone except for 2-3 players from the team last year left because of coaching. What am I missing here?

The Coach says to never pass back??! Has he never watched a high-level soccer game before? Teams want to maintain possession until it is possible to attack, and often times that means passing backwards and resetting. That quote alone was alarming. Sorry about your experience there.

Anonymous wrote:No one cares if a club team wins or losses games. The only thing that matters is whether the players are learning and getting better. That’s it. Players looking to play beyond high school should be working on their fitness and individual skills themselves (1-2 hours a day). Team practices are largely tactical but have to work with the talent that is available. Games are for fun, and to put showcase the individual skills within the tactical set ups.

Do think anyone knows or cares who won mlsnext last year? Look at the club websites. The “selling” being done is all about who is going to play at what college, or who is turning pro. No college coach or professional club gives a flying xxxx about how many wins a player’s club team had last year.

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:With VYS coaches at the helm of BRAVE, they play direct, transition ball which is the opposite of BRYC possession ball and positioning that is taught. No wonder there is confusion when merging players and I can't see how it's going to benefit talented BRYC players whose only job will be to look mediocre and play it directly to the fast forward(s).

Certainly talented BRYC players get recruited by other clubs but why can't those clubs develop their own talent/promote from within? They want to profit from the work of others who have developed these players for them.

The play is rather direct but seems to progress over the years. Not sure how many BRYC girls are on the ‘08 and younger rosters. I believe not a single one on 2011.

I would say talented girls from any club get recruited not just the special BRYC ones. Let’s stop pretending the clubs are the biggest reason for development. It largely falls on the individual and the work they put in on their own.

How do you play direct when OP says they only play with one striker? 5 central midfielders leads me to believe it’s not a confusion issue on possession vs direct but confusion on the formation. There must be some wide, left, right midfielders?

Most teams around here that I’ve seen use 5 Midfielders and a back 4 are just parking the bus…And when they gain possession they are just pinging it long in the general direction of the striker and hoping for a fluke goal. Definitely have seen some BRAVE teams play that way.

This sounds terrible. I can see this if you have a lead to preserve in the final minutes but to play like this all of the time is criminal. Young players will never develop doing this. How is Brave winning with this style of play?

It is terrible and you are absolutely right that it does zero for the players long term…It just makes the results more palatable. BRAVE teams have a combined 28 wins in 96 matches, so there is a lot more losing going on than winning.

Is that the girls side or both? What about Union, Arlington, NVA and VDA? How many wins on their girls side in comparison?

No one is saying Brave is the best around, at least I think, but it seems that some of the teams have outperformed expectations.

And if their terrible strategy does not develop players then surely by U16 (2008) these other teams with their superior styles should be running circles around these undeveloped girls right? Or do these other clubs need one more year to prove they develop (recruit) the best?

If you strictly want to look at points per game from U13-U19 on the girls side through the current year, it would look like this... Brave still cradled at the bottom.

1. NVA - 1.95
2. Union - 1.73
3. VDA - 1.62
4. ARL - 1.23
5. Brave - 1.20

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If we are talking about MV- dude is a clown. Get your kid out of Brave ASAP. Horrible coach, horrible director. Imagine asking kids to sit back and defend the whole game. Makes 0 sense, horrible for development.

MV’s 10s and 08s have scored 42 goals total across 18 total games this fall (9 each). No other club in the area has that many goals across those 2 age years. I could probably add the 11s and it would still be the case. The game scores are in direct conflict with your claims. The 10s scored 70+ goals last year.

As written earlier, the 09s have been snakebitten since the early VYS years. They have only scored twice, and their striker is newly promoted from ECRL. I suspect they are doing the best they can.

My DD has played for MV, and they have built out of the back since 7v7. I don’t know where that is coming from, but seems to be taken out of context.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If we are talking about MV- dude is a clown. Get your kid out of Brave ASAP. Horrible coach, horrible director. Imagine asking kids to sit back and defend the whole game. Makes 0 sense, horrible for development.

MV’s 10s and 08s have scored 42 goals total across 18 total games this fall (9 each). No other club in the area has that many goals across those 2 age years. I could probably add the 11s and it would still be the case. The game scores are in direct conflict with your claims. The 10s scored 70+ goals last year.

As written earlier, the 09s have been snakebitten since the early VYS years. They have only scored twice, and their striker is newly promoted from ECRL. I suspect they are doing the best they can.

My DD has played for MV, and they have built out of the back since 7v7. I don’t know where that is coming from, but seems to be taken out of context.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If we are talking about MV- dude is a clown. Get your kid out of Brave ASAP. Horrible coach, horrible director. Imagine asking kids to sit back and defend the whole game. Makes 0 sense, horrible for development.

MV’s 10s and 08s have scored 42 goals total across 18 total games this fall (9 each). No other club in the area has that many goals across those 2 age years. I could probably add the 11s and it would still be the case. The game scores are in direct conflict with your claims. The 10s scored 70+ goals last year.

As written earlier, the 09s have been snakebitten since the early VYS years. They have only scored twice, and their striker is newly promoted from ECRL. I suspect they are doing the best they can.

My DD has played for MV, and they have built out of the back since 7v7. I don’t know where that is coming from, but seems to be taken out of context.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Clearly some of the clubs are good at developing players. How else do any of these girls become YNT and P5 college?

People are overestimating how much players are “found” and “developed” by clubs. Its not like club coaches are finding kids with raw undeveloped talent playing on dirt fields and teach them the game.

We’re talking about a large population of parents with a lot of resources that get their kids private trainers, camps, equipment, strength and mental fitness programs, winter futsal, and the academic resources that allows them to be accepted to highly competitive colleges and afford the high tuition. The development is mostly done individually and outside the club with parent resources. Most every one of these local girls going to P5 schools has been doing all this external development since they were 12 years old. Many have moved clubs one or more times.

I know because my DD is part of it and I see what everyone else on the team is doing including her. The clubs role in all this is to facilitate the connections and opportunities to play in front of college coaches.

I agree with the bolded statement above. If you are waiting for the travel coach to transform your kid into an amazing player.... don't hold your breath. It's our 3rd year of travel with 3 different 1st team coaches... each coach brings a particular skillset when it comes to coaching the team, but usually that skillset is honed to coaching the team instead of individual players. There is very little emphasis to work on individual skillsets that advanced players require....i.e. I have yet to see any coaches address 'body feints' when dribbling... how about a step-over turn? Nope. You have to develop these at home, in skills clinics, camps or private training. The players that get recommended and or selected for Youth National Team Camps or get D1 College offers do a ton outside of Travel Teams. After 3 years, kids that only learn while at travel practice are significantly further behind kids that do extra training. I tried getting some of those kids to make a back-heal pass or do a step-over body feint and they couldn't do either. Many of the travel coaches simply don't have time (or the knowledge) to develop/ refine skillsets that sets kids skills apart.

Anonymous wrote:If we are talking about MV- dude is a clown. Get your kid out of Brave ASAP. Horrible coach, horrible director. Imagine asking kids to sit back and defend the whole game. Makes 0 sense, horrible for development.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Clearly some of the clubs are good at developing players. How else do any of these girls become YNT and P5 college?

People are overestimating how much players are “found” and “developed” by clubs. Its not like club coaches are finding kids with raw undeveloped talent playing on dirt fields and teach them the game.

We’re talking about a large population of parents with a lot of resources that get their kids private trainers, camps, equipment, strength and mental fitness programs, winter futsal, and the academic resources that allows them to be accepted to highly competitive colleges and afford the high tuition. The development is mostly done individually and outside the club with parent resources. Most every one of these local girls going to P5 schools has been doing all this external development since they were 12 years old. Many have moved clubs one or more times.

I know because my DD is part of it and I see what everyone else on the team is doing including her. The clubs role in all this is to facilitate the connections and opportunities to play in front of college coaches.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Oh yea. The icing is that the coach recently canceled a tournament we were supposed to go to in Dec but he’s going with other age groups. no email. No communication. Just removed it from TeamSnap.

That sounds unprofessional and unfair to the players. Have you reached out to the club's overall Director of Coaching?

09g coach is DOC.

Don’t bother…horrible communication, lack of direction, only cared for certain players (last year the 08s who were trap players who were part of the reason the team had a few wins) Even if you reach out you’ll get or rather your player will get penalized for it by being given the silent treatment and/or benched. It’s a lose lose situation.

Anonymous wrote:OP here. The roadkill comment is a bit harsh as there is talent on the team. There’s just no chance to show it. Team plays a 4-5-1 with 5 central midfielders. No one wide of the hash marks on offense. Half the team plays direct long ball to the one striker who if she’s lucky to get the ball is surrounded by 4 defenders. Coach says never to pass back so then the striker tries to take on the 4 defenders and ultimately loses the ball. The other half of the team tries to play possession passing. But with 5 central midfielders they are all passing to players standing 10 feet from each other. On defense, when the opponent builds out of the back through their full back, there’s no wide players in the offense or midfield. So the 5 central midfielders and our defensive full back all look at each other to figure out who’s supposed to step up. Every game and every time it’s a different player or any many cases no one.

My point is that the season is almost over and DD or team should be coached on basic things like what do we do when we have the ball, who is supposed to guard players on the other team. During games give players instructions on how to adjust.

Apparently this team had some success last year. We arrived to learn that literally everyone except for 2-3 players from the team last year left because of coaching. What am I missing here?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I believe the Dallas area has 6 clubs that compete in ECNL:
Sting Dallas Black ECNL
Solar SC ECNL
DKSC ECNL
FC Dallas ECNL
Dallas Texans ECNL
Sting Dallas Royal ECNL

Agree our area should have less, but I think the direction the ECNL will take is more clubs, not less.

Brave
Union
NVA
Vda
Arlington
Bethesda
Maryland United
Pipeline

If you are including pipeline, md united as close to VDA and NVA, then you’d also group together all the south/central jersey & philly area teams

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I believe the Dallas area has 6 clubs that compete in ECNL:
Sting Dallas Black ECNL
Solar SC ECNL
DKSC ECNL
FC Dallas ECNL
Dallas Texans ECNL
Sting Dallas Royal ECNL

Agree our area should have less, but I think the direction the ECNL will take is more clubs, not less.

Brave
Union
NVA
Vda
Arlington
Bethesda
Maryland United
Pipeline