GA made a smart move teaming up with MLS. The 2008-2012 years are already baked in. The key for GA improving in this region begins with the 2013 imo. There’s an opportunity there. Texas top GA club “Lonestar” jumping to ECRL last year hurt. However, the Houston and St Louis GA clubs are legit. Get a few more to that level with the help of the MLS tie-in and Texas could once again become a battleground between the two platforms. Wasn’t long ago when clubs like Solar and FC Dallas were part of DA
Youth soccer club
- Thread starter BasPlayr
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Im just gonna be clear: you were kind of
ting on the age groups that left for NL at WSA and really shilling for GA. So to see you talking about players doing the DP for NL and how awesome is strikes me as hilarious.MLSnext is going to be a problem for ECNL. Look how many boys Greenwood is taking from Energy to play Next. How does Energy combat that? Do they go Next to keep relevant in the boys side?
Wasn’t my intention to criticize people for playing for whatever club or platform they choose. Funny that one of the WSA coaches actually talked to us about not chasing alphabet soup. We made our decision to stay together before we knew TSC was getting GA.Im just gonna be clear: you were kind of
The problem is primarily on the boys side. Energy boys will certainly feel the effect. Maybe if they’re the only ECNL club in the state next year the additions from TSC (those not quite good enough for MLS Next) will make up for those losses. A better question is what platform will TSC boys be playing on come 2026-2027? ECNL will be gone and MLS Next isn’t going to happen.
TSC also said they hoped girls would leave to chase NL. It was super funny to hear them say that after using NL as their selling point.
You guys made your decision when the only option at the time was ECRL- Frontier league? That’s something I wouldn’t have expected. No top team parent group from TSC who had played competitive would have made that decision.
I don't think we were looking at it as a long term decision. It was definitely not the preference.........
I get that. I also understand there’s a bit of nativity present due to having very little personal experience with competitive soccer. I’m happy for you to land in GA. The Frontier conference is below average quality of soccer from top to bottom from a competitive standpoint. Your girls would have taken a huge step backwards playing in that league. Apologies to anyone whose kid is playing in the Frontier league
It does sound like you guys are on a training schedule to be legit competitive team. Very few TSC girls teams trained like that during my time there. Tulsa’s 2013 and 2014 area girls have talent. Hopefully those groups can stay together and make some noise in the next few years
Honkv, after reading above, I feel like you are blaming clubs for not dealing with inter squad bs between players. I think that is hilarious. I am not sure why that is on TSC. I put that on coaches.
Girls are obviously than boys but we would not have run to Keith Eddy to settle stuff between boys. Guys would have just had it out and been done with it.
Girls are obviously than boys but we would not have run to Keith Eddy to settle stuff between boys. Guys would have just had it out and been done with it.
It’s a process, right?
Speak to your own kid, have them try to work it out (check)
Speak to the parent, try to work it out (check)
Speak to the coach, try to work it out (check)
Speak to the director, try to work it out (check)
We followed the “chain of command” and tried to squash it without the club. It just didn’t work.
At some point, the club needs to push the culture they want to see prevail. You so t have to be best friends, but you do have to at least be teammates.
Our story was pretty simple. We were in Dallas for a couple of days due to a family emergency. My daughter’s first ECNL showcase was a week away. We got written permission from TSC’s ECNL Director for my daughter to attend one training at a Dallas club so she wouldn’t miss a training. Her TSC coach announced she would be benched for the showcase for training with an outside club. The fact we received permission from his boss didn’t seem to matter. We had plane tickets and hotel reservations for Phoenix. FC Dallas said they could get her card transferred and have her added to her roster in time to play in the showcase. Which is how we ended up in Dallas. Two of her teammates moved to Energy shortly thereafter.
I’ve heard about that and even before interacting with you, I disagreed with the way TSC handled that. It sucks that it happened, but at least it worked out pretty well in the end.
Not long after we talked about how
ty the culture was at the club, especially in the girls side, they announced the leadership program. For us, that was too little, too late.The coach was fired six months later so at least there was some karma in the endI’ve heard about that and even before interacting with you, I disagreed with the way TSC handled that. It sucks that it happened, but at least it worked out pretty well in the end.
Not long after we talked about how
A positive culture is so meaningful at these age groups. Pre-teens and teens struggles with esteem and image issues and when you're talking about team dynamics for sports, everything from appearance to the equipment and cleats you wear to your quality of play all seem ripe for the picking by other players trying to establish themselves as the alpha. You see it a lot in school settings as kids transition from elementary schools to middle schools bringing a lot of kids together from a lot of places and they're all trying to establish themselves.
My experiences, mind you I've been in student life/student development since around 1996 and been through multiple student development classes on theory and practice, it amazes me that the majority of coaching licenses (here and abroad) touch very little on the psychological development of players individually and within a team dynamic. Again, the focus is on winning so they don't care that a player is struggling mentally with the game, they don't know how to address it and they don't understand how things at school, personally, etc. dig into those things and then if you have a toxic team environment because players have sorted themselves into cliques, it gets even worse. Not only that but that toxicity frequently spills into the parents as well.
Yes, exactly!
👏🏼
My daughter is no saint. But we believe in accountability and have made her apologize face to face for stuff she’s said behind someone’s back.
My daughter is part of Union's pom program. Talk about toxicity and cliques. I hate that aspect about it but she loves dancing. Hoping that moving to 9th grade next year and kids start being a little bit more mature and understand more about the team dynamic stuff because the junior high stuff was excruciating and listening to the drama about how this one girl thought another was talking about her and wanted to fight over it. We've told my daughter to keep other girls' names out of her mouth if she is not talking directly to them. And this is another setting where they've hired, typically, fresh college grads to coach the JV and junior high sides (varsity has an established coach who has coached at Union for 10 years and she was even the pom coach at TU for several years). These young ladies know about dance and pom and what to do with that aspect, they have no idea about student development and some of the things these girls are going through. They don't know how to help develop leaders although they've appointed captains and co-captains.
Point is, U12-U16 are age groups where coaches really need to be more than just a coach....they need to develop more than just soccer skills if they are going to get the best out of their players on the pitch.
Hopefully she loves her new team. We all pay way to much $$ not to be happy…..
She does! She’s incredibly happy and has this confident swagger that she’s been missing for a bit. It’s amazing to see her happy after training.
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