As the U.S. Soccer Federation Development Academy Showcase is set to begin Friday in Greensboro, there are a number of reasons for the Fed to feel good about the 1st year of the revolutionary new concept that has changed the face of elite youth soccer in this country so much.
We ran a series of articles on the topic you can see here - here - here and here and most of the comments we received from players, coaches and parents were positive. Even the criticisms leveled were generally in the context of "the soccer is better." So, as far as that goes, well done to the powers that be for the 1st year of the venture.
But let's not get too carried away patting ourselves on the back. This is the future of American soccer we're talking about, and we're nowhere close to being there.
The main premise of the Academy initiative was to get our top youth players away from playing so many matches and having too little training. It is also meant to do something about the vicious cycle of results feeding stature for the sake of the intertwined towers of club and college recruiting, which in turn had teams as young as U10 using cynical tactics to win games and events rather than teaching skill.
So a strong statement has been made, supporting the preeminence of clubs as developers of talent. Serious guidelines have been set in place to offset the previous trends of too many games, too many low-quality games.
Don't think it couldn't come unraveled quickly. It could.
The fact remains that nearly all of the teams competing in the Academy are still on a pay-to-play model. Those that don't have a professional team or some other benefactor footing the bill, and for those lucky few there has to be a knowledge that such an arrangement won't last forever. Unless something works out before too long to justify the investment, those clubs will be in the same boat as the rest, it just makes sense.
I don't buy into the argument that the Federation should just pay for this, that is totally unrealistic and no matter what the correct figure for the $ amount USSF has in the bank ($60 million or otherwise), that bank balance would get down to zero pretty quickly under that scenario.
What can happen however, is a steering of sponsorship and resources to make the overall travel cost significantly lower. It will also help when the Federation revises conference alignment for next year.
Another idea would be to nix the June Showcase, which is irrelevant for most of the U18 teams and players, and instead have half the teams compete in 2 events, and the other half compete in the other 2. You can still match the teams up for the Showcases inter-regionally if you wish, but don't ask families to pay for 3 of these events, especially if these teams are also possibly going to attend another event during the year such as Nike Friendlies, Dallas Cup or Disney Showcase.
Here's something else that might build enthusiasm about the Showcases (which do attract a lot of college showcases): make it a Cup competition. You could crown a winner in each half of the country with 6 matches (3 at each Showcase which is how many they play anyway). Some have suggested making this a play-in for the National Academy finals, but I don't like that idea as it would dilute the mission of using season-long league play as a better developer of talent. Still, a separate Cup competition couldn't hurt, and you might even be able to have a 2nd Cup competition at the 2nd Showcase meeting, sort of like a UEFA Cup vs. a Champions League. I won't get bogged down in the details here.
While the scouting has been extensive in the competition, a vigorous effort will be required to really make a positive impact at the coaching and developmental level. The steps to add younger age groups and eventually, Girls play, will need to be carefully thought out. Not to a pessimist, but there's a lot that can go wrong. Diligence is required.
But even all of these things are secondary to the issue of cost. We are charging the clubs with conducting this vital task of developing our players. We cannot fail to help them acquire the tools to do it, and we cannot simply assume parents will foot the bill lest we truly make the sport for the rich only (or completely irrelevant on the American sporting landscape).
I'm generally positive about what has happened but let's keep our nose to the grindstone and make this go from good to trendsetting and earthshaking.
