#1 - Widen the base – Move the tip of the pyramid higher - Increase the grass roots schedule by three months to increase the number of players, at the grassroots, playing soccer more year round. Many of our players play soccer for 3-5 months a year. This is not enough.
     Even if the leagues provide 3 months of play, most players play soccer 1/4 of the year. By the time they are age 11 they are not very good. Watching High School soccer this year, I am struck by the number of players who, had they played more soccer, have many of the qualities to play soccer at a high level. Would they have made it – who knows – but we know 100% the players who follow their path of  playing 1/4 of a year of soccer  will not. US Soccer should embrace a nation wide movement to increase the number of months kids play soccer - “soccer – the year round sport” or  “Soccer.....the every day sport?”
 
#2 – Improve the first four years of instruction – Every foreign youth director, from Ajax Amsterdam to Porto to Chivas Guadalajara, who we bring to Northern California loves the youngest players - but they like them less and less as they get older.
   US Soccer should start a “Youth Academy Initiative” focused not on the top but on the bottom. Create guidelines and instructions to clubs on how to develop players ages 7-11. Encourage clubs to put their best coaches with those teams. Encourage clubs to create a club and soccer culture which is more than playing the game – teach them to love and embrace the game so they stick with it until they are older. Teach…….no demand, the clubs and their coaches concentrate on the basic skills necessary to compete at the highest level. Give clubs an approved “Youth Academy Stamp” which means they meet the standards and follow the practices necessary to develop young players.

#3 – Improve the coaches education – What do they really do for youth coaches.....the coaches upon whom the National Team relies to develop players? They pawn off youth instruction to CYSA and other USYSA affiliates.  They provide subpar national C - B- and A courses. They do not, on a consistent basis hammer home the need for us, coaches, to improve ourselves. They need to be in our face on a consistent basis pressing us to learn more.

 Imagine a campaign focused on the following simple concepts:

High Level Coaching is:

* Proper intensity in training – without intensity the training is wasted! I have watched youth teams in England, Holland, Belgium, Czech Republic, Germany, Italy, Spain, Mexico and even Belize. Every youth training is sharp, with intensity and energy. Not so in the US!
 
* Content of training – what is taught to whom – tactics to U9’s no – tactics to U18’s yes – skills, fundamentals, all the time!

* Number of trainings – what do the world’s top clubs train – ages 8-11 three days a week, ages 12-15 four times a week, ages 16-23 four to seven times a week – for 9-10 months a year.

* Choosing Proper Competition – Chivas Guadalajara wants their players to have 60 international matches before they graduate their youth academy. Is this for rankings? No, it is because they recognize a player must have many experiences to be able to step into a professional match! They need to travel and play, play against different styles and systems, play under different pressures, play when they must win to advance and play when the emphasis is to develop.

* Developing a love for the game….it does little to play soccer well when you are 12 if you are not playing it when you are 20! Create a culture of soccer...remember 100 years ago the Brazilians did not know soccer.......now it is part of their DNA!

   US Soccer should hammer home these concepts day after day!

    Coaches....after training....ask yourself......did you have the proper intensity? Did you have the proper content....according to your kid’s level.....are you training enough times per week, do you have to go to the 8th tournament.

    At this point the US is picking players off an under developed tree. There are fruit trees, on a property next to my house, which are poorly watered, never pruned, never fertilized and generally not developed properly. The consequence is an occasional peach, apple or plum which is tasty. If it rains a lot one year it might be good but its unpredictable. Consistently the level of fruit is poor.....it is hit and miss, it is random. Talking to a local farmer about this he said while you can improve the tree’s yield (its fruit) you will never be able to get top level fruit because the early work was not done properly.

Down the road, there is a property with fruit trees which were planted well, they are taken care of properly, the trees are pruned each year and the fruit is consistently remarkable – year after year. Why, because they did the little things properly from minute one. These trees create wonderful pieces of fruit  - the fruit makes wonderful jam. Our clubs are farms, our teams are trees and our players are fruit.

   If you improve the farmers....improve the farming.....you improve the fruit!

   Currently, US Soccer is trying to take fruit from trees which are poorly planted, sporadically and improperly developed, and they expect to make a top level product. Can they make jam? Yes! But what is the quality. Will it be world class.....never! Will it be international class........never! Will it be national class.......only if your nation’s level is low!

  They need to think about our 2000 age group in 5-10 years. What do our U10’s need to do to realize their talent?

     Watching the Academy Showcase in Lancaster in December was an eye opener. The level of play was mediocre – in most cases. The technique average – in most cases. The tactical insight mediocre - in most cases. Of course there were some exceptions – Columbus Crew U18’s, LAFC, Arsenal and a few others.

Who do they compare this to when they say the game is improving as a result of the Academy? To Ajax, Arsenal, Chivas, Porto, or Schalke? Why not compare our top to the worlds top? Why look at each other when the world has examples of top level football to try to emulate?

   Most teams took 3-6 touches to do almost anything with the ball, there was no attention to detail...sure a pass made it in the area of the player but not where it should have been or with the proper pace.  The coaches could/should work only with the ball doing fundamentals for a month and then try to work as a team. The were very few teams with ideas in the attacking third and except for the Hispanic players – who were very skilled – and a few players from the other clubs  - the level of skill, was average and the insight was lacking .

   Of course this is to be expected when our players only train 2-3 days a week. This in itself is an indication of how serious we are about developing top players. When a top club is training 5-8 times a week with their U16-19’s and we train 2-3 times we should not expect to develop top players. If we want to get serious.....train more! If this is our top we have a long way to go.

   The US Soccer people need to get moving with a serious, thought out plan which addresses improving the overall quality of the crop over the long term while trying to improve the jam with the fruit presently available to be picked.

  Kudos for them, USSF, for entering the youth soccer scene – now they need to take steps to develop the structure, the player education and the coaches education.

  The time is moving too quickly for our young players – especially those who hope to play at the highest level. I wonder why can’t an U10 player expect leadership from their federation – now – to insure they are using their power to educate and at the very least influence the soccer clubs, their directors, their coaches and their parents – on a daily basis.


Benjamin Ziemer