Belligerent,
Good point on keeping the team at Challenge level, it keeps the Bridge FA philsophy consistent. I can see your options were limited.
If you just pulled over the Summerville team and your idea was to keep them intact, then yes, you wouldn't have had a pool large enough to make two 8v8 teams. And you are right....that Summerville team was very, very good.
You are obvioulsy not in agreement with USYSA or USSF's philosophy of playing 8v8 at the U-12 level. I'm sure the boys benefited from playing up against bigger, stronger competition. They probably got more out of this than the supposed "extra touches" they would have gotten at 8v8.
I have to call you out on your first statement though....that the state U-12 league is neither of these team's (clubs) responsibility. I hope you are limiting this opinion to just the U-12 league and not the whole SC Challenge and SC Classic leagues which are overseen by SCYSA.
We all need to be good citizens and play nice together ;>)
