To give 2004striker credit, he's been discussing his belief that mergers would be positive for SC players from before the time that SGU and GFC merged -- so I don't think that his statement is a knee-jerk reaction to this weekend but rather is a polite "I told you so" with regard to his argument concerning mergers being needed.
CESA gives over $60,000 of financial aid for qualifying players each year. From a financial perspective, my guess is that CESA is able to do much more to reach out to those that can't afford soccer than most combinations of clubs. If you go through any financial model, I think you'll find that if you want to "reach out" to disadvantaged socioeconomic families that a larger club has advantages that a smaller club can't match.
Finally [and please note that I'm seperating this from any discussion concerning disadvantaged socioeconomic families, since to do otherwise would imply a causal connection that does not exist], you should have watched the U18G game yesterday where there were at least four minority players playing superbly for the two teams, both teams representing clubs that were the results of mergers in the last 12 months. Is this enough? Has any club in SC done enough to expand and deepen the penetration of youth soccer? I don't think so. But I do think that larger, rather than smaller, clubs have the resources to be better able to do this. I know that CESA is committed to doing this ever better in the future.
