2020 Spring Leagues and Tournaments

A new season is upon us. Players will move, some teams will disband (hopefully not) and other will get stronger.
The chase for the #1 spot in the ranking, starts... now.

So who has the juiciest rumors on players moving clubs/teams?
 
Well I guess congrats for Legends winning State Cup first off. Two years ago there was a parent who would post almost every game on YouTube. It was those videos that eventually put me here....

Cedar Stars Monmouth has added the two best players from Lehigh Valley Black over the Winter Break. Lehigh Valley is going to take a big fall in March. Cedar Stars is now on pace or better than PDA Legacy.

DKSC will likely stay on top until SuperCopa. I pick Cedar Stars to win every tournament they enter, including SuperCopa. PDA for some reason is not entering any tournaments at this point?

Seems like there is a lot of parody in SoCal this year. I have no idea who will come out on top at this point. One thing is for sure, they will be well represented if the GOATS go to SuperCopa.
 
Wonder who had the biggest jump in Fall '19? I would guess LAGSB or Rebels?

There is another team I know about that will likely jump from +/- #550 who will be probably close to top 150 by end of Spring I am guessing....but they are in Maryland.
 
So Cal Blues Rennie will be much stronger. guess Rennie made a lot of moves. Took a couple top players from their sister team, to form an elite team. They will be a force this next year.
 
We heard about some troubles brewing in the Slammers world In the HB area, anyone with reliable info?
The South Bay/ LB area also appears to very active lately....
 
Hearing top Slammers team might be playing only 11v 11 most of the season for ECNl preparations. Makes sense to me....
 
Well I guess congrats for Legends winning State Cup first off. Two years ago there was a parent who would post almost every game on YouTube. It was those videos that eventually put me here....

Cedar Stars Monmouth has added the two best players from Lehigh Valley Black over the Winter Break. Lehigh Valley is going to take a big fall in March. Cedar Stars is now on pace or better than PDA Legacy.

DKSC will likely stay on top until SuperCopa. I pick Cedar Stars to win every tournament they enter, including SuperCopa. PDA for some reason is not entering any tournaments at this point?

Seems like there is a lot of parody in SoCal this year. I have no idea who will come out on top at this point. One thing is for sure, they will be well represented if the GOATS go to SuperCopa.

Will be good to see DKSC Voutier and Cedar Stars in Cincy. DKSC is playing in top boys 09 league in Dallas so will be interesting to see if that has helped them develop even further. Big Tex has the best pulse on Texas soccer though.
 
DKSC hasn’t played an 09G team since last years Super Copa so it’ll be interesting to see how they fare. Solar Angelone will be at Jeff cup in a few weeks and will likely draw Cedar Stars in semis so that should be a good litmus test for both teams going into SC. Solar is sending Solar South and a combined super team to Cincy that should make for Some very strong comp. Should be 5 top 10 teams in cincy by June.
 
Hearing top Slammers team might be playing only 11v 11 most of the season for ECNl preparations. Makes sense to me....
Doesn't make sense to me. I'd rather get more touches on ball in 9v9. Big field is too big if majority of girls on team have not gone through growth spurts yet.
 
Doesn't make sense to me. I'd rather get more touches on ball in 9v9. Big field is too big if majority of girls on team have not gone through growth spurts yet.
I think those teams are saying "we have girls that are ahead of the growth chart and we are not concerned." If they can pull it off, it is smart for them to get ready for 11 v 11 early. But the field size increase, game time increase, and roster size needed are all game changers and it will put a lot of strain on a 09 team.

Especially because there is an unexplainable drop off in the number of players starting with the G09 group. This is something that I have noticed but I now have numbers to back it up. For example, there were 215 '08 teams when they were U11 in 2019. There were only 185 '09 teams this year. There were 244 '08 teams across National Cup and State Cup this year. It remains to be seen how many '09 teams will be added - the likelihood of adding 50 teams to close the gap? Very little.

"What is 30 teams? It means nothing!" you say? Well, that means that there are approximately 15% fewer players. Hence, the whole economics of the clubs will change. And how you need to build the teams will change. Teams that recognize it and plan for it correctly (everyone will have their own way of responding) will survive.

"Winter is coming." - Jon Snow, also Joe Stalin
 
What are "good habits" for U12 players that 11v11 promotes and 9v9 does not?

Don’t want to debate what’s better or worse:

More player movement; 18 girls on a SS field limits players ability to move into open spaces;

True defensive skills A person in a small sided game is supported by 2 or 3 girls in close proximity. Big field these will be massive liabilities if someone can’t defend properly or doesn’t have the speed.

Work rate: SS with 18 girls limits a player field responsibility, in other words, a positional field responsibility is much smaller.

Kickball by backline: SS field promotes high press tactics which creates pressure to backline to just kick the ball away mentality.
Big field a team will surely get punished if they high press entire game.

high skill players can’t create as much in the middle due to shear volumes of opponents in the middle. Big field If a team wants to overload the middle they will get punished. The skilled mid will even have more touches than on a SS field.

Size of nets: goalies will have to be more aggressive off the line on big fields;

SS promotes weaker teams to park the bus which is fine, but that creates opposing teams bad habits for shooting. So in those games, a players will shoot the ball high which in my opinion is not technically the correct choice. Too many legs in the box. Settling for the easy high shot; instead of the final 1/3 IQ needed on the big field.

I have more thoughts, but I’ll leave it at that.
 
I think those teams are saying "we have girls that are ahead of the growth chart and we are not concerned." If they can pull it off, it is smart for them to get ready for 11 v 11 early. But the field size increase, game time increase, and roster size needed are all game changers and it will put a lot of strain on a 09 team.

Especially because there is an unexplainable drop off in the number of players starting with the G09 group. This is something that I have noticed but I now have numbers to back it up. For example, there were 215 '08 teams when they were U11 in 2019. There were only 185 '09 teams this year. There were 244 '08 teams across National Cup and State Cup this year. It remains to be seen how many '09 teams will be added - the likelihood of adding 50 teams to close the gap? Very little.

"What is 30 teams? It means nothing!" you say? Well, that means that there are approximately 15% fewer players. Hence, the whole economics of the clubs will change. And how you need to build the teams will change. Teams that recognize it and plan for it correctly (everyone will have their own way of responding) will survive.

"Winter is coming." - Jon Snow, also Joe Stalin

Interesting observation. I have little doubt the explanation is related to the financial crisis. when people might have been 'gettin busy' resulting in 09 births they were best case pragmatically deciding not to have kids for economic reasons or more likely just trying to keep the marriage together while under financial duress. Especially the club soccer demographic which had probably in the prior couple years won some bidding war to buy their first home with a little downpayment loan. no doubt the birth rate spiked down while there was an inverse spike up in the divorce rate as financial stress a strong predictor of divorce.
 
Bump in birth rates around 07/08 and been dropping since.
The financial crisis of '08 and '09 definitely contributed to the decline in birth rates and partly explains the participation decline. But the sudden decline of 15% in participation doesn't get explained entirely because the birthrate did not drop by 15% between 08 and 09. Perhaps there are a lot of '09 girls in the '08 group. But clearly, something must've fundamentally changed a few years ago when '09 and '10 girls got into the game. Perhaps it is YouTube. Perhaps it is the price tag. In a few years, we will get to see if the participation is a steady and sustained decline.

This bring me to the main topic of this thread...getting ready for the next season. As SoccerFan4Life mentioned, I think many people are having a lot of difficulties getting players this year. There is a fundamental issue of supply being cut off. And it will be a bigger problem next year when the roster size (demand) needs to increase. So, be patient friends! It is the only way, unless you are Duke and Kentucky who can get 5 star recruits every year. (As you can see, there are ways to beat Duke and Kentucky. You just can't play the same game as they do.)
 
The financial crisis of '08 and '09 definitely contributed to the decline in birth rates and partly explains the participation decline. But the sudden decline of 15% in participation doesn't get explained entirely because the birthrate did not drop by 15% between 08 and 09. Perhaps there are a lot of '09 girls in the '08 group. But clearly, something must've fundamentally changed a few years ago when '09 and '10 girls got into the game. Perhaps it is YouTube. Perhaps it is the price tag. In a few years, we will get to see if the participation is a steady and sustained decline.

This bring me to the main topic of this thread...getting ready for the next season. As SoccerFan4Life mentioned, I think many people are having a lot of difficulties getting players this year. There is a fundamental issue of supply being cut off. And it will be a bigger problem next year when the roster size (demand) needs to increase. So, be patient friends! It is the only way, unless you are Duke and Kentucky who can get 5 star recruits every year. (As you can see, there are ways to beat Duke and Kentucky. You just can't play the same game as they do.)

There is no competing with Kentucky :), well said.
 
Besides the usual swap of players between Slammers FC and Blues, any other major players movement?
Is any ODP player changing club?
 
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