Youth soccer club
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I have been many times to BA that have been less than stellar. We used to play in a what they attempted to make a non-political academy league out there. It was meh. The younglings area for tournaments is no bueno. I have been at BA again and the fields were no bueno but it was also rainy.
Their parents are apparently a trip out there. I have heard this from many, many different groups of people—lots of referees, parents and coaches. we played express a couple of times. It was uneventful. But we also pounded them and we were all pretty young.
TSC fields and scheels league use the painting robot. The lines are perfect. Turf is huge in the rain. You don’t tear up the fields, and they still get to train.
Jenks doesn’t realize what they have on their hands there. People come from all over to spend money in that area.
There is a weird contingent against that cal Ripken deal. It sounds kind of neat. There is a weird group of people that still think Jenks is like the 60-90s Jenks. In actuality, it is kind of just a big section of Tulsa and different school district now. The burbs have grow past it and really extending to Glenpool and Bixby. There isn’t really a separation now. For me there is more separation between owasso and Tulsa than Jenks and glenpool. Hell, I might even go as far as Mannford. Some of the houses in Mannford are in f’ing insane. Utter huge, huge mansions built on lots of acreage.
I hope West Bank improves. it is a total horror show. It sucked when I played there from the early 90s, and it has only gotten worse.
Colorado did the same thing with letting teams play at the high schools. I was there a bunch for DA games. Rush did that with their teams.
I have been at Metro High Schools once for TSC vs Texans boys. Jenks high school has the nicest training facility bar none. BA has two great gigantic fields but their locker/building situation isn’t ideal. I was told Jenks couldn’t put lights at the training facility and turn it into games because of the airport, which feels odd considering what Titan North has (it will always be titan to me) . Sapulpa’s field is actually really, really nice. I don’t know why the high schools don’t try to show their stuff off given open transfers. Jenks, owasso and Bixby’s football fields are very dangerous fields for Soccer given the proximity to the stadium and fencing. Bixby’s soccer field is nice.
Real has a total pimp 2 field setup. The top one is world class. I don’t know if it is still at that level, but it was beyond incredible. I was the very first DA game with Sophie Wilson and Jaylen Howell against FC Dallas. First game FC Dallas won 3-2 in the 16/17s and the second game Real beat them 9-0 or so in the 18/19s. Bar none the best girls team I have ever seen step on a field. That Real girls team went the ECNL national finals and lost 1-0 the year before that. Jaelin and Sophie didn’t play in that tournament because . They were already training with the full women’s team by that time. They were both 17. Sophie wound up at Stanford and won the national title there. Jaelin was at Florida State and won it twice and was Herman trophy winner 2 times. They played on the same friggin team their whole life from like age 4 in Fort Collins. I wound not be surprised if there were at least two other girls from that team in the NWSL.
Wynalda is a prick and almost a nihilist. I am tired of listening to Landon Donovan talking about commitment when that guy took a year off before the World Cup and then demanded to be back on the team. That is a trumpian level of hypocrisy.
"The best players we have are playing in Sunday leagues across the country." He said this. That is an utter line of complete and total BS.
I laughed at the because they had accents comment. That was much worse back in the day. Parents had no idea who was good or not because they knew nothing about soccer. Now, many of us have played at a decent level and are a little more discerning. He is a little too mean about coming and going. Some want a change of scenery or to marry an American. It is a little more complex. Tulsa had some exceptional coaching around because of the NASL Roughnecks that hung around. Some of those individuals, such as Alan Woodward, played significant roles in huge leagues. He is still the second all-time leading scorer at Sheffield United.
But some need a shot.
Look, David Critchley is the head coach of Saint Louis SC. He is a British national who played at Oklahoma Wesleyan, coached at NEOFC, transitioned to an MLS Academy for SLSC, and is now in their interim head coaching position at SLSC. He has got some pretty decent reviews in the first couple of games. But the first couple of places would fall under Wynalda's criticism of playing overseas.
Guess what? The MLS pay is also improving significantly.
He decries the lack of ODP.. Did he mention that 30 MLS teams don't pay, but that isn't until 13? Guess what? ODP didn't exist until around 13, too. Are we missing kids from South Dakota, North Dakota, Maine, or Montana due to the lack of ODP? No they sucked. Everyone believed they were strongly biased towards CA, TX, NJ and NY. And, heck, the MLS teams will even pay for kids to move and live there now.
Older people become old and bitter.
Some of the things are accurate. There used to be one team and fewer clubs. True about one team. Wrong about fewer clubs. Now we probably have about the same or less. They are just bigger because more kids are playing. However, some of the teams are just glorified rec teams. Some kids start lower and grow. Lawpoke testifies about this with his daughter. I have seen this too.
The ones who love it and want to improve will work outside their practices. If they play with the top teams, they will be at a significant disadvantage. They will make the top kids weaker, and they will get discouraged. Solving that problem is difficult. I think you give the kids who are showing up a chance to play here and there. If they show signs of success, you give them a shot. It is hard at the younger ages. Parents come in from the YMCA or other recreational leagues and say, 'My kid scored a lot of goals, but the skills, speed and knowledge are very different here. ' Now, they go in and get smoked. Some improve. Others don't. That is the nature of the beast.
Back in the day, "We knew everyone great... Steve XYZ. That is accurate. I have spoken to several children who don't seem to understand the other children at a high school. It seems weird to me. Back in the day, we played Union, BA, Jenks, and Bishop Kelly. We knew exactly who we needed to deal with. We all played against each other since the age of 10, and often played against one another. BA could still stock a team full of the best kids. In 4A (all teams, not in 6A (5A then) were in 4A, you were fortunate to have a full squad of competitive players. Even if the competitive players were not notable, they were still a step up from the rec or kids who had never even touched a ball.
"Sunday leagues", where Wynalda believes that the real talent exists. I didn't know where those mysterious Sunday league players he believed came from. That sounds nice. But in actuality he is full of
. Perhaps it's because he had success with the US Open team from California a few years ago, and a few were "Sunday league guys" Now, the NL kids never play against the ECNL-RL, OPL NPL, GA, BA, or MLS-Next kids, so they have no idea who those players are. We did have some different-level competitive leagues; I forget the names. The top kids might be spread across 2-3 teams in an age group. In my age group, three different teams in Tulsa have placed multiple kids in D1 schools, as well as numerous D2 and NAIA schools. So is that really that different? N. I would have liked to see WSA, Blitz, and TSC play each other, but they all play in various leagues. You can say it's for political reasons, but it's a little more complicated due to the nature of the leagues. There have been some powerful teams from WSA or Blitz, in particular, in a specific age group. They had some good players, but they just weren't as good across the board. If you think otherwise, you are just ig orant.
Sure, a game in a tournament might have been 1-0, 2-0, or 2-1, but if you watch the game, you know this. It is the same sort of reason you see T inidad or Nicaragua beat the US or Mexico from time to time.
That is because soccer is so tiered now that the competition doesn't see each other. Side note, the top kids are already learning from each other from OKC and Tulsa. At my son's age, they are learning to despise Edmon. I don't think they like us either. I told my son that I dislike only grocery stores. We hated Celtic (yes, they were the best squad in OKC) and the Royals back in the day, and that hatred only grew stronger from playing against them from the age of 1. That's starting at six now.
In Oklahoma, the ODP All-State kids are typically ECNL-NL kids, with a few exceptions. The top leagues attract the top talent, even if you dislike Barry or the coach in an age group. In OK, ECNL-NL is similar to ODP Oklahoma East and West, except that it also includes kids from Northwest Arkansas and southern Kansas who travel to participate. Initially, there was an east-west dichotomy in organisational development (OD). You were chosen here, then you trained with the West Side kids, and ultimately, they picked you for the all-state team. I know that was what happened. I played in it. It was mostly the top KD. Where does the vast majority of the D1 talent come from in O? Those are the ECNL-NL. If there are others, it's rare. It is just a basic stat. There are peopl are completely self-ab orbed about their kids talent levels, bitching about politics at the club because they are not playing. And hell, it might be. Guess what, the vast majority is not the case.
In actuality, their kid just wasn't as good as they thought. They are too proud to admit it, too ignorant to realise, or lack the patience to work to prove themselves. When you start playing at those levels, it is, really, really cutthroat.
Many of the people that bitch don't have children or are even around the youth soccer. Or I think their kid sucked, and they are bitter about that too.
We are examining the failures of the US team and the rest of MLS. The MLS is better than it used to be. I is a function of the academies.
The USMNT has different problems—no need to go into that here.
The players are more talented. Remember when we were excited that Alex Lalas played for Padova for two years, while also being in his rock band? America had arrived!!!! Now, we wouldn't even be a national headline.
For whatever reason, this has not translated into national team success like Americans expect. It is one of the few sports in which we don't excel. Part of that is that it is the most competitive sport in the world due to the large number of people who participate in it. Americans don't like that. Where is the critic's view on Tennis? American men haven't done anything for years. The last truly great male players were Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi. The US loses a lot at the Ryder Cup. Who isn't crying?
I have grown tired of listening to people bitch about pay-to-play. Soccer is the most prominent sport that is constantly discussed. Guess what? Every US sport, except perhaps football, is already there. In this direction, football is now adopting 7-on-7 formats, and players and parents are investing in offseason training to improve agility and speed.
Have you ever heard about the high costs associated with becoming a NASCAR driver, baseball player, or gymnast? Not nearly to the level of the announcer's whining on TV because we lost a particular game. It's because some of the announcers are atrocious. Being a good player doesn't necessarily make you a good coach or announcer.
These people come with ZERO solutions, or they are hilariously bad. Wynalda does say this and says it isn't going away.
Sorry if my thoughts are disjointed. This brain puke reflects my agreement and disagreement with Wynalda, as well as my effort to be nuanced.
Wynalda is just an old hag. I loved him as a player, though.
PS. God, that was a long type.
There are no easy answers to fixing American soccer. One might argue one of the roots of the problem lies in the American need to win. Clubs, coaches and especially parents shouldn’t care about winning until U13. The sole focus should be on development. That means possession, playing out of the back, movement off the ball, playing through every level, team ball, small sided games, touches, etc….basically how soccer is played in the majority of the elite soccer counties of the world.
Instead the focus is usually on winning. Kick it long to your best couple of players and have them beat the defenders. Many coaches avoid extended possession in your half because that results in turnovers resulting in scoring opportunities for the opposing side. We’re not teaching the game because too many coaches are teaching winning to appease their club and parents. Parents lack the sophistication and patience to understand getting beat when my kid is 8 because we’re teaching possession will payoff when she’s 15.
Emphasize touches. Play small side as long as possible. Parents scream to play on as big of a field as possible as early as possible because they view a bigger field as more advanced soccer. Very few realize how many fewer touches the kids get as the field and number of players increase. Training hours should be at least 10 to 1 to playing hours. Our kids in general don’t spend near as much time with a ball at their feet as kids from the elite soccer countries yet we expect them to compete
All I got. I don’t know enough about the club structure or US Soccer structure compared to other countries to really make an informed argument there.
Instead the focus is usually on winning. Kick it long to your best couple of players and have them beat the defenders. Many coaches avoid extended possession in your half because that results in turnovers resulting in scoring opportunities for the opposing side. We’re not teaching the game because too many coaches are teaching winning to appease their club and parents. Parents lack the sophistication and patience to understand getting beat when my kid is 8 because we’re teaching possession will payoff when she’s 15.
Emphasize touches. Play small side as long as possible. Parents scream to play on as big of a field as possible as early as possible because they view a bigger field as more advanced soccer. Very few realize how many fewer touches the kids get as the field and number of players increase. Training hours should be at least 10 to 1 to playing hours. Our kids in general don’t spend near as much time with a ball at their feet as kids from the elite soccer countries yet we expect them to compete
All I got. I don’t know enough about the club structure or US Soccer structure compared to other countries to really make an informed argument there.
Lemme just say: it’s pretty amazing what an environment change can do for a kid. Getting around a group that values you and cheers for you really does make a huge difference. Watching my daughter go from hating team training last year to being happy about team training and even asking to play 3v3 again is awesome.
That’s not a dig at TSC. I know someone, somewhere, is reading all my posts and screen shooting and sharing them, so let me be clear about that lol
That’s not a dig at TSC. I know someone, somewhere, is reading all my posts and screen shooting and sharing them, so let me be clear about that lol
You’re not special. Screenshots of my posts have been sent to third parties as well
You’re not special. Screenshots of my posts have been sent to third parties as well
Glad it's not just me lol
Feel free to DM me and I’ll repost whatever you want me to say about Tulsa youth soccer. Heck, I might throw Wynalda $100 on Cameo and have him say it for you
When do you guys head out to San Diego? We leave in the morning.You’re not special. Screenshots of my posts have been sent to third parties as well
Come find us tomorrow. I’ll have the girl w the FCD soccer bag, a crazy 11 year old boy running wild thru the terminal, a 16 year old boy who won’t be acknowledging he’s w us and an annoyed looking wife
alright: these bathrooms at Westbank are unacceptable. Holy moly.
Unacceptable is a compliment, they are 4 levels past that.
Probably not a good time to tell you the restroom facilities at nationals (surf sports complex) consists entirely of porta potties . Now everything else is first class
We always buy the week pass. It’s not more than $60 and u don’t have to stop and pay once u have it. Parking is hit and miss depending on when you play. If you play anywhere near the west half of the complex I recommend driving to the far west lot. Tends to be less crowded. There will be a line to enter the complex especially on day 1 so give yourself a little extra time. The setting is absolutely gorgeous. The complex sits in a valley surrounded by the California hills lined with multi million dollar homes. Horse farms are also scattered about.
There will be fog (marine layer) until around noon almost everyday. So everything will be really wet if you play in the am. Bring sweatshirts and pants. A extra pair of shoes are nice as well. Mornings and evenings are quite chilly.
This will be our 5th time at Surf. By far my favorite soccer event and setting .
At least it will be dry by them. Weather as always will be perfect. Those late games do ruin your day for doing anything else though. Hopefully you have some fun team activities one of which is at the beach
There’s another side of parents that is problematic as well. The side where they “reward” their kids for goals but not assists, or a good defensive tackle. There was a kid who played on my son’s TSC team whose dad paid him $10 for every goal scored…kid had fantastic feet, good technical skill with the ball at his feet, but the kid wouldn’t look up nor would he pass the ball and his control was so good that it usually frustrated defenders and brought them out of their shape meaning there were teammates and space to create lots of chances.
Thank you. Games start on Friday. We play the defending national champions on Saturday. Lucky us
Thank you. Games start on Friday. We play the defending national champions on Saturday. Lucky us
Layering on the love for those from Tulsa competing in ECNL playoffs! Sending great vibes ya'lls way. 👏
Thank you. From what I know we have Tulsa girls playing with
10 Energy
11 Energy
10 FC Dallas
10 KC Athletics (showcase)
SuperCopa was an absolutely incredible experience. The fields, the tournament organization, the level of competition--every aspect was top tier. I’m so proud of our girls, the coaches, and all the families who supported this journey.
We performed well in pool play, finishing 13th in points out of 42 teams, which placed us in the Gold Bracket. In the quarterfinals, we faced HTX, a team ranked #14 in the nation. We lost 1-0, with their goal coming late in the match. We dominated the second half and created chances but couldn’t quite find the back of the net. Such is the nature of this game.
What this tournament reinforced for me is just how special this team is-- they are gritty, cohesive, and full of heart. Competing with the best in the nation only validated what our family already felt: this group has something rare. It's energizing to be part of a team you believe in.
No club, team, or organization is perfect and there are always trade-offs. But our first tournament experience with the new team was a reminder of just how grateful we are to be on this journey. It was powerful and poignant.
That's awesome! Any suggestions on best place to follow along virtually? I always enjoy hearing the recap on this board, but I imagine there is an online site where scores or standings are posted along the way?
Playing in ECRL next season was a really smart move by Waylon imo. Will benefit the girls the next year when they hit NL
ECNL playoffs site provides scores and updated standings. They also livestream a number of the games.
2025 ECNL Girls Playoffs - Elite Clubs National League
The official athletics website for Elite Clubs National League
theecnl.com
I agree--it seems strategically wise on multiple fronts. It set a clear expectation around the level of commitment required for both competition and travel, while also providing an early baseline against the high level of talent in Texas. That exposure will hopefully give a short but valuable window to learn, recalibrate, and adjust where possible. It also helps acclimate the team and families to the match format, substitution rules, and overall structure that will differ from past experiences. All of these are guesses from my perspective as we are new to the environment, and curious as to other's perspective.
Parents aren't great overseas, either. There are YouTube videos out there about the Crystal Palace academy. It features young kids, parents,and coaches
I see this in a lot of parents including myself….parents tend to be much more involved and intense with the first child. By the third the reasonable parents have figured out that it really doesn’t matter what happens in a soccer or baseball game at the age of ten.
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