It Could Get A Bit Messi In Here - The Football Thread.

I’m Just Ken said:
I know Benfica and FC Dallas are now working together for talent development.
Click to expand...

I think it needs to be bigger and more institutional, with incentives for prioritising homegrown players and quotas of homegrown players u21 in every match day squad in the league. I don’t think that the college system helps the MLS either. The clubs won’t get those players young enough to stave off the big Europeans hunting for the bigger youth stars. The best clubs in smaller leagues at it, like Benfica and Ajax, look to keep their youngsters till 22/23. They blood them as teens, get some of the benefit out of them and then sell for a profit. They’d only plan to be selling generational talents that they can’t hold onto very young. If you’re not getting them until their out of college it’s too late for that development path, if they’ve not already been tempted across the Atlantic.
 
Last edited:
Joe Mac said:
I think it needs to be bigger and more institutional, with incentives for prioritising homegrown players and quotas of homegrown players u21 in every match day squad in the league. I don’t think that the college system helps the MLS either. The clubs won’t get those players young enough to stave off the big Europeans hunting for the bigger youth stars. The best clubs in smaller leagues at it, like Benfica and Ajax, look to keep their youngsters till 22/23. They blood them as teens, get some of the benefit out of them and then sell for a profit. They’d only plan to be selling generational talents that they can’t hold onto very young. If you’re not getting them until their out of college it’s too late for that development path, if they’ve not already been tempted across the Atlantic.
Click to expand...

Agreed. The entire system is much different here. The pay to play system definitely doesn’t help. I know MLS has created MLS Next Pro but I’m not sure if every MLS club has a Next Pro club. This system kind of undermines the USL tiers and even more now as MLS has pulled out of the US Open Cup tournament. But I think another factor is the difference in salary compared to Europe. If the MLS can ever get close enough, that could help amp things up.
 
I’m Just Ken said:
Agreed. The entire system is much different here. The pay to play system definitely doesn’t help. I know MLS has created MLS Next Pro but I’m not sure if every MLS club has a Next Pro club. This system kind of undermines the USL tiers and even more now as MLS has pulled out of the US Open Cup tournament. But I think another factor is the difference in salary compared to Europe. If the MLS can ever get close enough, that could help amp things up.
Click to expand...

Trying to fight salary wise with europe in the early stages of a completion, or in a country, that although big and rich, where the game is down the pecking order isn’t realistic. It’s an issue even within Europe given the juggernaut that the premier league has become. The only way to fight it is to invest in young players, be they local or raw “undiscovered” from abroad, and develop them better.

I get American sports have traditionally had their own way of developing and distributing young talent and in many ways it’s really laudable but I think there needs to be a recognition that in those sports it’s a closed market, there is no external competition, never mind bigger richer and more prestigious competition and that maybe trying to transplant the American model into a global game isn’t a recipe for success?
 
Jonathan Y said:


here we go again
Click to expand...

6dc56a15-fa6f-4af6-92c6-0367cad57e8b_text.gif
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top