Our club system has developed as a result to support college enrollments...very broad based supporting not just the best of the best players but also the very good ones.
Maybe it's a minor point, but I would take issue with this, as it makes it seem like US youth club soccer is well integrated into a rational system of developing players/students for college. I find it much more haphazard, with most clubs and coaches really having very little idea what the college soccer scene looks like and what college coaches are actually looking for. In the larger sense, I'm not really sure that US youth soccer is really "geared" to much of anything at all beyond perpetuating itself.
Personally, I'd go even further and argue that the main driver of the American club soccer environment was that DOCs, coaches, and tournament directors recognized an opportunity to earn a decent living. Part of how they did so was using college admission/scholarships as a lure. Nothing really wrong with all this; to the extent that they're failing to develop world class players, I'd also say that the US Soccer fed didn't do enough to ensure high standards.
The European Academy system tracks...by 8 you are picked for an academy team and to get on afterwards is very difficult but plenty of players are cut along the way. Their focus is on developing the best of the best, and if others can't hack it, well too bad so sad.
I'd also take issue with this. DA here follows this exact logic too, just like the small slice of very top Euro academies. Here in the US we expend a huge amount of energy trying to sort out the elite and casting aside everyone else - tryout season lasts months, every single year. It's true that the very top European pro club academies are very competitive. However, the thing is that there are so many professional teams academies and even private academies, late bloomers have plenty of opportunities to play at a very high level and still bounce back up to the very top in their late teens or early twenties. But furthermore, because soccer is so highly integrated into everyday life, there are many more opportunities and resources in recreational soccer. As a result, the overall soccer IQ and culture is much higher in Europe, which makes it easier for the top players to develop soccer intelligence. (Does anyone remember that article about Ajax in the NY Times sunday magazine from years ago? It discussed how the dutch invest heavily in recreational soccer, on the assumption that if they teach everyone, a handful of kids will fall in love with the sport and develop excellence in it.)
And even if you could change things, how many middle class families would be willing to send their 8 year olds to an academy that takes them off the safe academic track for a risky chance that they might be Messi (assuming puberty is kind and the kid turns out to be gifted and doesn't suffer a debilitating injury), when its more likely that the kid is going to wash out, or if they are lucky, that he might get stuck playing for an MLS team for a few years at roughly the salary of a civil service job....it's why so many of the greats come out of the barrios.
I may be wrong about this, but my impression is that at least the top Euro club academies are now investing more in the academic education of their youth players, not because they care about the kids, but because they feel that it helps develop the intelligence required to be a top player on and off the field. Similarly, it's my impression that in Europe, players are now coming more from the middle class than out of the projects. (See
Das Reboot)
Having said all that, I agree with your broad point that it's very different in Europe and the US and it's hard to see how things could change here:
I'm not picking sides on which system is better or worse-- they are both geared to producing different ultimate ends. But the United States is never going to have a system like Europe so long as we think college is a place for kids to get a broad education and that every kid deserves such an education, and so long as sports is linked into that system (and you aren't going to delink them for any of the sports so long as college football and basketball remain as popular and are such moneymakers for the colleges).
I'd just add that the differences are even more fundamental. In the US, we value choice and the individual, private pursuit of happiness, so there are many more different sports to play or watch. In Europe, the culture is a little more monolithic, centralized, or unified, and for historical reasons, soccer is the primary activity for youth recreation and competition (for boys, at least). The soccer scenes reflect those differences.
What it did show is how poor most women defenders are! Marta is like no one else we've seen in the women's game for the most part. That's why it seems like it's comparable. The speed at which Neymar does his dribbling skills is blows my mind. When he's not rolling around for getting hit by a feather, he's sure fun to watch!