SC Soccer Forums SCSoccer.com Forums Club Soccer & ODP Bridge and Summerville Soccer Club - Why now???

This has just been sent to Parent of SSC/Bridge players

Quote:

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Please pass on to your parents that there will be a general membership meeting on 6 Sept at 7:00 at SSC for the purpose of voting on maintaining the agreement or ending the agreement with the Bridge.
Check the SSC website for more information.
In general: The original agreement stated the Bridge would only conduct challenge soccer for ages U13 and up. Subsequently, the Bridge has formed two U13 teams that are playing in the classic division and they have U11-U12 teams playing in LSYSA. Both of these actions violate the original agreement. In addition, (1) the SSC Board is concerned about our limited resources (fields) and making sure SSC gets priority, (2) the board wants SSC to be able to have challenge soccer back at SSC, and (3) the SSC Board wants to offer challenge soccer for less

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Looks like it's boing to be another barn burner. Two steps forward and 10 steps back Why can't they just get along. Ignorance is bliss. I'm sure the other area clubs are just laughing at the stupidity of the Board. Supposedly there was a presentation last week at SSC regarding the Bridge but I can't find any minutes regarding it on their web page. ALSO, for that matter, I can't find anything on the Bridge web page. Can someone help me so I can be informed before the meeting?

Here's what's interesting to me about the letter. While justification for breach of agreement is given in the form of Bridge not limiting itself to challenge or higher level soccer [and to me that seems to be a very good point], that justification is not in and of itself what seems to be the fundamental issue. SSC wants cheaper challenge soccer of its own on its own fields.

If I were a parent involved in this, my questions to the SSC would be

• Have you asked Bridge to immediately cease and desist from offering anything other than challenge and higher level soccer? If so, what was the reply? If not, then this really isn't about that, is it?
  
• How much cheaper will SSC challenge be than Bridge? [And by "cheaper" I mean both the posted rates and the average price paid including financial aid.]
  
• How much less competitive will SSC challenge be than Bridge? [If the answer is "none", then I'd put my hand on my wallet because someone is trying to get away with something here.]
  
• What is the rate of contention for field resources, i.e., what does the agreement expressly state concerning field prioritization and how specifically is that hurting the SSC programs?
  

I wonder if 2) isn't the real driver?

Just start another club...that is what other people in the midlands have done when they don't like what is going on.

Tough pill for Bridge FA to swallow. I've seen this one before. It is very difficult for a club to NOT field competitive teams until U-13. It's difficult for some clubs to NOT field competitive clubs until U-11 for that matter.

When your competition is investing their time & effort into U-8's, U-9's and U-10's.....and you don't get to put your kids into this environment until they are U-13.....you are at a major COMPETITIVE DISADVANTAGE.

What's the solution? Bring the U-9's through U-12's together for pool training once or twice a week....while they continue to play rec/classic/challenge with their home clubs?

Check this out: The recently formed Bridge 94 Girls Team (U-12) are competing in the U-13 Classic Division of PMSL. The players on the team come from the following clubs/teams from last year:
Bridge U-13 - 1 player
James Island U-11 - 7 players
Charleston Attitude (U-12) - 3 Players
Mount Pleasant U-11 - 1 Player
Summerville Soccer Club - U-11/U-12 - 2 Players (One was the leadings striker for her team last year)

Also of note last weekend Bridge 94 lost 8-0 to Coast.

I know the field situation has a lot of people upset. Almost every Bridge team is practicing at the SSC complex at least once a week. No one is getting a full field and in some cases three to four teams are on the same field at a time.

I wonder how many teams are practicing on James Island? They have a lot of space there.

Call a spade a spade!

What you have is several board members that are far too interested in getting a pound of flesh from the current director and are missing the bigger picture of providing opportunities for ALL of the players, not just their little Johnnie or Susie. As is the case in most volunteer situations, only interested people volunteer. Unfortunately, in this case, the volunteerism appears to be negatively driven.

It is these same board members that have taken what was intended to be a "cooperative" arrangement and boiled it down to a black and white, fostering ill-will, in an attempt to gain enough support to be able to advance their own personal agendas.

The real funny thing in this is, who is going to be voting? If Bridge FA is the current challenge program for SSC, and this vote is about the challenge program, the only remaining "SSC" challenge players which will be represented and therefore have a vote on this is parents of multi-player families, since Bridge FA players are not members of SSC and therefore have no voting status at SSC. So in the attempt to take care of SSC, they are neglecting the opinion of all of the former SSC players who have chosen to play at Bridge FA.

So continuing with the thought of calling it like it is. You kind of have to hand it to the ones behind this. It's probably not too hard to compile enough hate and discontent from parents of players which during evaluations were deemed not to be able to play at the challenge level, and therefore are playing ability appropriate at the Classic level.

As far as the field situation, you would think that with a common director this could have been addressed rather than allowed to fester to the point of having a general membership vote. Of course that is unless the SSC board member responsible for coordinating the field usage, had a different agenda.

An absolute mess is potentially about to happen because you are going to have mis-informed parents who have been listening to people with hidden agendas, voting on something. Of course I guess that's our political process at it's finest.

In the end who is going to suffer, the PLAYERS, who have no vote!

Yes...they are part of the alliance..two weeks ago two summerville teams practiced in a small area behind field G.
I would say about 32 kids and on field G was a Bridge team with about 10 kids using 3 goals...If the idea is for these clubs to grow in numbers then I do not see any choice than Bridge to start using some of James Island's fields.

Maybe I'm missing something here, but I don't see how this will negatively effect Bridge except by keeping them off of SSC fields and it sounds like they have sufficient alternatives.

As far as player retention, hasn't that horse already left the barn? Bridge has established itself as the Premier club in the lowcountry. Won't the premier level players still want to play for Bridge?

Sounds like to me that SSC needs to be working within the Alliance for improvements rather than abandoning it.