Shearer -- thanks for the kind words. Since you asked, and since there is speculation out there on this thread since you posted this, I’ll be glad to tell you the odyssey that led me to these postings and let you know who I am. However, I’ll warn you up front – this will be a long, and probably very boring, post in which I take you through the personal trip that got me to where I am.
I actually am no one in the Columbia soccer scene; I just have a daughter (Kira Campbell) that plays for ODP-90 and the Lexington United U-13 and before that played for the Lexington Amazons (the team that won the challenge cup state championship in 2001 in their division). I took the screen name “Shibumi” from a book I read some years ago; it’s a Japanese term and doesn’t mean anything in this context other than I liked the book. I wasn’t trying to hide my identify; I just thought that my identity wasn’t very important.
I've been studying Columbia soccer for a few years now trying to understand it. In my posts, my few critical words are for the Lexington club – in particular the girls club. This isn't personal; in fact, I'm extremely thrilled with the Lexington team my daughter plays on and I believe her current coach is absolutely fantastic. In fact, I think that we’ve been blessed personally with a few good coaches in the years here in Lexington. And I've never had a problem with any club because of the typical stuff -- playing time, money, too much travel, etc. So I guess I'm not the typical disgruntled parent -- I'm more of an interested observer trying to figure out how to replicate what my daughter has been fortunate enough to find for all of the girls in this area.
When I first began trying to understand the Columbia soccer environment, I came to the same conclusions that many did -- that there were just too many clubs. The more I tried to understand it, the more confused I became. So I've spent a lot of time talking to various people about the current club situation; basically listening and trying to understand. My wife several months ago finally got me to begin reading this message board. I never planned on posting until the "one club" subject came up -- and I only posted regarding it because I had come to the conclusion that the basic problem was ***not*** too many clubs. I came to this conclusion after having the opportunity to watch a lot of Atlanta players over the summer and watching top Atlanta teams in various tournaments. What I saw was that the disparity of talent that I’ve heard so much about wasn’t nearly as large as I thought it was. These teams are incredibly fundamentally sound at the team level – and the individuals, while well schooled, match up against the best I’ve seen on South Carolina teams.
By the way – for at least anecdotal evidence of this – as Paul Armstrong posted a few months ago -- in a highly competitive tournament held in Florida (with several state championship teams competing and very large brackets) two SC U-13 girls teams ended up in the championship with the very, very good one from the upper part of the state winning on PK’s.
The more I looked into this overall situation, the more I became convinced that the real issue was not that the players in South Carolina weren’t good enough, or that there were too small a talent pool from which to draw, or that there were too many clubs. Instead, I became convinced that the real problem with South Carolina soccer was that the level of coaching needed to be improved through the provision of greater resources to our coaches and that some clubs did not have a clearly defined mission that could be objectively judged. I actually believe that the mission/goal issue is more important in the long run because if you get that right then getting the best coaches with the right resources becomes an operational issue. I think that the coaching issue isn’t because we have bad coaches; but rather because in many cases we’re not giving the coaches the resources that they need to be the best.
In my zeal I then tried to “put my money where my mouth was” – I tried to donate money to the team my daughter played for and began to talk to some companies to do the same. The reasoning was simple: if you want better coaching, then you need to get the coach and the team better resources. I found I couldn’t donate the kinds of sums that I thought would make a difference – the team was not registered appropriately (i.e., a non-profit with the right federal identification). The people who help run the team then tried for months to make this happen, but it was blocked (or just not assisted) at the club level. So far, I’ve not donated a cent despite months of trying.
At that point some additional issues concerning coaching resources and the spirit of the club began being debated. All of this simply further exacerbated my concern with respect to coaches, particularly girls coaches in Lexington, having the full resources needed to consistently build competitive teams at state, regional, and national levels.
Now, for everyone who has made it this far that believes that I should shut up and just switch to another club, let me make it clear. First, I do not believe that players and secondarily their parents choose clubs – they choose teams. Secondly, as I mentioned before, we are incredibly happy with the team and coach for whom my daughter plays. I would just like to see other children, and in particular, other girls, be able to play highly competitive soccer in the future. This is the reason that I praised CSC/CFC; I’m hoping that perhaps they can together marshal the resources to have highly competitive regional and national teams at younger levels because I believe starting when a child is in high school is a bit late. My daughter is taken care of at this time; she’s getting what I consider to be one of the best coaches around. I’d just like to see that be able to be done at a club level, and not just through heroic action by a few girls teams.
And I’m not trying to change the world here to make Lexington soccer better than any other club. The reason I asked in other threads what the mission was of various clubs was that I was trying to understand if there were really clubs that had made a strategic decision to defer to other clubs competitively. If Lexington girls’ classic club is such a club, and that is clearly the objective, then it’s not bad – it’s just a fact. But if it is a fact then I want it articulated clearly so that I can then understand how serious the combined CSC/CFC is about highly competitive younger girls soccer – because without that, I know that trying to be the best in older groups is going to be very tough.
So what am I doing on these message boards? I’m still trying to learn about the overall situation. I do not believe that what I think that I know constitutes any final truth – rather, it’s simply a subjective view into a very complex situation. Eventually, after I learn enough, I’ll be able to perhaps make a difference – but for now, I’m just learning and I find the best way to learn after listening for a while is to form opinions, present them honestly and openly, and then let others disagree with you so that you can learn from them. I appreciate the time that some folks have taken on this board helping me learn. I realize that some folks get on these boards every time someone posts something critical and talks about “club bashing”; but unless people are willing to discuss what they believe and other people are willing to listen and respond, it’s not clear to me how we’ll leave this situation and get any better.
