I don't mind paying more so some rec kids have a chance to play, but for $3000+ per player, our team should be able to practice soccer at soccer practice. Please move these rec teams and pickup players off the travel fields! I don't mind paying for rec kids, but I do mind our kid only having scraps of field space to practice. Having to deal with rec teams AND pick up players and only a quarter of space on the fields is nuts.

We are new to Herndon this season and really regret leaving our former club. It never occurred to me that club practices could be so chaotic or that teams would be given so little space. (My son regularly had half a field to practice on three times a week since U13 at two previous clubs.) The Arrow Park field is complete insanity.
It honestly feels like a fight could break out there any moment.

There has been a lot of drama over finances with HYS soccer board, I don't think any one knows where the money comes from or goes because their accounting is sloppy.

It does seem safe to assume that travel is subsidizing rec, given the Herndon demographics.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why would you take field space away from high school boys travel teams and give it to rec teams? Herndon has plenty of grass fields with goals for rec teams to practice on. The grass fields are apparently nice enough to play AC Milan travel games so they can't be too bad.

That is not a smart business decision. Driving away your club customers who pay $3000 to please your rec league customers who pay $50 (and are heavily subsidized by the travel fees) seems very foolish.

Do tell how travel subsidizes rec???? Again have your travel team practice on grass. You do occasionally have games on grass after all.

Most of the Herndon rec players are on scholarships. Their $25 or whatever they pay certainly does not cover all the field costs and admin costs and league costs. Where do you think the money comes from ?

If they are trying to rebuild their girls side, pissing dozens of parents off so much that they vent on a public forum is NOT going to help attract more players next spring. Negative publicity on here has to be terrible for attracting new families. I know a lot of people who won't try out for Valor or GFR because of complaints on here.

Herndon admin need to fix these field issues or people will be complaining here all year. They will have tryouts next year and no one will
show up.

Anonymous wrote:Why would you take field space away from high school boys travel teams and give it to rec teams? Herndon has plenty of grass fields with goals for rec teams to practice on. The grass fields are apparently nice enough to play AC Milan travel games so they can't be too bad.

That is not a smart business decision. Driving away your club customers who pay $3000 to please your rec league customers who pay $50 (and are heavily subsidized by the travel fees) seems very foolish.

Do tell how travel subsidizes rec???? Again have your travel team practice on grass. You do occasionally have games on grass after all.

Why would you take field space away from high school boys travel teams and give it to rec teams? Herndon has plenty of grass fields with goals for rec teams to practice on. The grass fields are apparently nice enough to play AC Milan travel games so they can't be too bad.

That is not a smart business decision. Driving away your club customers who pay $3000 to please your rec league customers who pay $50 (and are heavily subsidized by the travel fees) seems very foolish.

Anonymous wrote:My son's U13 third team has half a field one night so we can scrimmage against the second team (other half of the field). and two nights with only a quarter field. I thought we got so little space because we were a third team but it sounds like we have more than a lot of other teams!

Are there really older teams with only a quarter field each practice?

Yes, even the RL boys HS teams only get a quarter field each night. My sons teams can't scrimmage at ALL any practice night or do most drills with such a tight space and so many adult sized people. Previous seasons we had half a field.

The MS/HS girls were assigned more space than the HS boys. Younger teams were assigned more space. Tiny u-little teams of ten players each were assigned the same amount of space.

I don't know why some team, like yours, have half a field one night. High school travel teams should have at least half a field once a week so they can scrimmage, and at least a third the other nights. I assume some of the coaches were "in" with the scheduler (like the TD team of little girls with half a field).

Or the admin made an executive decision that he didn't care about retaining any high school boys players for next year.

My son's U13 third team has half a field one night so we can scrimmage against the second team (other half of the field). and two nights with only a quarter field. I thought we got so little space because we were a third team but it sounds like we have more than a lot of other teams!

Are there really older teams with only a quarter field each practice?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think when HM was at Herndon he truly cared about the girls. “They” acted as if he was the worst thing to happen to Herndon. Unfortunately he left and it hasn’t gotten any better, actually it’s worse.

HM was a train wreck in a different way and he was no better for the girls program than what they have now. Total Football was good for the girls program but they ran them off and then the last coach they had that was good for the girls was JD but she wouldn’t fall in line with the craziness so she was run off too.

JD wasn’t much better. She definitely had her favorites. It was so much bs behind the scenes going on with her. Total 🐍

Anonymous wrote:They don't ask travel families which time
slot they prefer for practices!

Yeah I know. But presumably travel coaches had some input along with rec team parent coaches. Maybe too many of them wanted/needed 6:30 or later. It’s still the fault of whoever organized the field space because they should have had a system.

I think there’s a practice even later like 8 pm for teenagers.

Anonymous wrote:I think when HM was at Herndon he truly cared about the girls. “They” acted as if he was the worst thing to happen to Herndon. Unfortunately he left and it hasn’t gotten any better, actually it’s worse.

Hard disagree.

They don't ask travel families which time
slot they prefer for practices!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't know what going on but when I dropped off for later practice, it looked like 4, 5, 6, extra rec leag teams trying to practice on their feild. His coaches and their other travel teams who usually there were trying to practice on the feild at same time.

It was crowded like a mobhouse. My son plays sevral years and never have this.

It seems like there is plenty of space at 5 pm practices. Is it possible that too many coaches (and/or parents) did not want 5 pm practices thus making the later practices super crowded? Traffic is rough now with more people going to and from the office.

That poster is saying all the rec teams were crowded on the field at 5 pm with his coaches other travel teams who were also practicing at 5 pm.
He was bringing his player for the later (6:30) practice.

Which travel teams have plenty of space? My son's team certainly does not and we have two 5:00 and one 6:30 practice, all quarter fields for high schoolers.

Anonymous wrote:I have never seen kids treated better because they were on scholarship.

I definitely have. I’ve been asked to not collect any money from certain scholarship players and to collect more from paying families to compensate.

Anonymous wrote:I think when HM was at Herndon he truly cared about the girls. “They” acted as if he was the worst thing to happen to Herndon. Unfortunately he left and it hasn’t gotten any better, actually it’s worse.

HM was a train wreck in a different way and he was no better for the girls program than what they have now. Total Football was good for the girls program but they ran them off and then the last coach they had that was good for the girls was JD but she wouldn’t fall in line with the craziness so she was run off too.