I have a hodgepodge of topics I wouls like to throw out there and this seemed the best place to do it because of the posters involved and my rant (for lack of better term)involves tryouts and has the tide turned.
First, at CESA, we must realize they don't have tryouts but evaluations instead. One look at how the group is broken up immediately lets you know. In addition, players at the u15 try..er....evalutaion were told if they wanted to try to make the premier team they could work out with them (interesting?) on Sunday but if they did not make it, they would not be on any team. This comes from my son who is very reliable. As far as I know this was never communicated to the parents, which I think is very wrong. Also, the CESA premier team has had the same coach for what, 6/7 years while the challenge team has had 7 coaches in 6 years. Not what I think is best for the players.
Which leads me to my other point. The comment was made that CESA coaches have done nothing but try to help players. My guess is your children are head and shoulders, either talent-wise or physically, above the other players in there age group. I know that if you watched the CESA premier team play the challenge team this season (u14b) you would have thought they were in two different age groups. Add to that, every single coach, including the premier coach has said they same thing to my son during evaluations (I won't comment on others though I have had discussions with parents). Unbelievable with the ball at his feet and his ability to take people on, needs to work on his defense. Not one of these coaches regularly put him in a position to do what he does best (and a few actually critized him for taking people on in the attacking third even when he had no support) and NEVER put him in a position in a game where he would have to defend more (and I always asked him if the coach worked with him on defense in practice. His answer was always no).
This leads me to my third topic, has the tide turned. The u14 challenge team lost to the much bigger, faster, stronger and supposedly better skilled premier team 2-0 in state cup first round. It was 0-0 until late in the game and the second goal was total miscommunication between keeper and defender. They then scrimmaged a few days before the semi-finals and lost 1-0 while playing with 6 or 7 classic players on their team. In a word, CESA is DEEP.
I would like to see more of the kids get a chance to practice with the premier team (which isn't supposed to already hav been chosen) at these tryouts/evaluations. It is obvious, they can hang with them.
One final thing. I am planning on volunteering to be an unpaid asst. coach for whichever team my son makes. I think it is a disservice to the players for them to have only one coach (who splits time with multiple teams)who has no one to talk to about what he sees on the field, etc. My guess is I will be turned down, even though I have a license, played in college, coached club and coached high school. Whatcha think?
