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Another thing that would really help is having easier access to watch soccer. Soccer was never on tv when I was a kid in the 2000s. Basketball, football, and baseball all were on tv which led to me growing up loving and playing those sports. Same went for everyone I knew. We didn’t know anyone aside from Ronaldo and David Beckham. We didn’t care, it was all about the sports stars we had access to watch. We all spent hours a day replicating LeBron, Kobe, and even Tim Duncan trying to be like the stars we idolized. I want to see a generation of American kids who can turn on an MLS game any given night and find new players to love and show them the game. There shouldn’t be a need to pay even more to watch our own domestic league on “Apple TV”. People who fall in love with a sport at a young age will never abandon it; even if they’re not good players it’ll grow the fanbase and support for the game. Then they’ll show their kid all the games and take them to see their local teams just like past generations have done with the more traditionally popular sports here. Idek if I’m making any sense anymore this turned into quite a little rant. oh well, I think enough of my point got across. good video 👍

Soccer is a rich kids sport in my area. Who can pay $2200 club fee, $700 kit( new kit every year), three out of town tournaments in the summer, and staying in a hotel 4 times a season for league games? It's looking more like the early 90s when only a couple kids on the high school team played club. The coaching is so bad for both club and high school that its comical the way they do practices. The EA and ECNL teams here in Spokane WA are for the owners to get rich, and the parents get to brag at cocktail parties that their kid plays premier soccer lol

Thank you for putting this together. I don’t think anyone has really addressed the main issue: it costs money to get quality coaching. Doesn’t matter where you are in the world, a great coach will need some kind of compensation to spend time coaching kids. It’s correct to lament pay to play, but nobody seems to propose a true solution for how to compensate coaches if there is no revenue coming to the club. I’d love to hear more on this topic: if the club is free, where does the money come from for facilites, coaches, leagues etc etc

Imho, the main pivot that would most benefit enjoyment and skill development of soccer in North America would be to have more of a pickup soccer game culture.

Jake. Fantastic topic. Great guests. Great discussion. Thanks for your efforts!!

We could have tried to reform high school soccer with better coaching training, moving for states to adopt two seasons a year, and generally working up from the grass roots. But we had idiots in charge that wanted to recreate the European academies despite the complete lack of infrastructure to replicate them and so the parents paid for their stupidity.

I agree with all of these points. Great video and it would be great if this can get to the eyes of important decision makers for some change.

Good call out on the accessibility of coaching licenses. Like you, I have a USSF D license but cannot find myself to make that leap to C. Our club will reimburse us the fee over the course of 5 years though so that does mitigate it.

I like the school-sports model in the US where I am. Yes, the European model pays for kids to develop in the club and this is a great environment. This opens opportunity for a select group that may include some economically disadvantaged kids BUT school sports already do this in my area. And my issue is the Euro club model eliminates 99% of kids who might want to get into the sport. The club only wants to develop kids who show tons of talent around age 9-11. But what about the rest? School sports are inclusive. Anyone can try out, the school provides transportation, and at least at my school we did fundraisers and such so if you couldn’t afford the sports fee or equipment like cleats, you didn’t have to pay. Maybe schools won’t churn out the world class talent this channel wants, but I’m honestly ok with this and hope the model of professional athlete children doesn’t take over.

Great video! I'm definitely pissed about the structure of our top youth leagues (and I think it's like that in most youth sports - like lacrosse for instance). Making videos like this will help get the word out about how things really need to change. About the video, I was thinking you could do your lighting better so your face isn't so shadowy.

This video brought me to your channel and I'm hooked. You've got a new subscriber. I'm a huge fan of local soccer and love to support my local club, Indy Eleven. Id love to see you do some research and talk about the weird dynamic that exists between the USL and MLS in America. Maybe even dive into the MLS habit of opening expansion teams in cities that already have USL teams and effectively killing the local club scene. Indianapolis is currently going through this with our beloved local club's stadium being axed and the city bringing in outside ownership to build a stadium for a potential new MLS team.

I love the quick shade, "Broken clock"! 😂

Excellent video as always!

This is so accurate. We are paying $1800 for my 9 year-old to play club soccer. My other kids play rec league. The difference in coaching and skill set is more lopsided than I had expected!

Thank you Jake and your guests, that’s definitely insightful and optimistic. I don’t want to be the rain cloud bc I truly see the improvement in our senior team, u23s and U17-20s, but unless free mls academies start popping up everywhere, like several per state that provide a direct pathway to say Nyfc and the mls increases wages by a large amount and adopts promotion and relegation to infuse money into the clubs who get to move up where gonna be stuck right where we are. There need to be 60 or 80 clubs for example to make something like this work. 3 or 4 divisions of 20 clubs and the last and first three need to move up and down. But to make this happen the unthinkable in American sports must occur. NO PLAYOFFS. In addition soccer still must compete with already established, more popular football basketball and baseball, sports that have domestic final proving ground that leads to actual wealth for those who reach the top level of their sport. It’s an uphill battle but i think our best shot is having our players develop here early on then go over seas. What are your thoughts Jake and guests.

Thanks for making this video. It has been an eye opener when I had learned about this pay-to-play system in US youth soccer after watching few videos in this topic. It's really sad for 9yr old son who has been obsessed with soccer in last 2 years and a standout player in his local recreation team. I'm in a crossroads whether to get him to join a local traveling club and jump into this pay-to-play system bandwagon or stick to recreational sports. The college recruitment process for soccer talent seems to fueling US soccer pay-to-play system. What's the point of paying all that money over the years for a shot at small slim chance at landing a D1 scholarship where only 11 players in the roster get the free ride. Even if my son gets a free ride as a D1 player, he will be focusing most of his time and energy being a student athlete and not into his study and the end goal of land a well paying job. In the end, it's better off saving/investing all that money for future college tuition than line up someone's pocket.

Great video on a big problem in American soccer

@ItsCalledSoccer So Jake, I believe you on that breakdown of Europe vs US funding but do you have a link to the actual research or report for more details?

Growing up I didn’t have a lot of money, I played rec soccer up until my 8th grade year where a local club offered me a “scholarship” to play for free. The amount of skilled I gained in the first 2 years of club was bigger than my entire life playing rec soccer. Give the best kids a chance and we can be the best in the world in soccer too

Same in Australia. Greed prioritised before junior development.

To help me understand this better, can you compare this to how kids learn the other 4 major team sports in the US? (not just compare to how England does it with soccer) Like, how much did a pro football player spend in their youth leagues? Baseball, basketball & hockey too? I'd imagine hockey is fairly expensive- needing all the gear and renting ice time, on top of coaching. Whereas basketball is probably less, because a young kid can develop a lot just by playing friends/siblings in the driveway - because a team just has 5 players, it's easier to assimilate real-game scenarios with fewer people. But that's a guess. Does anyone know more about how all 5 sports compare in that respect? And can anything be learned from the other sports?

How about starting with having 2 covered Team benches at every field and bathrooms.

Expat Englishman in Virginia. Four kids, one of whom (6) is eligible for travel football. Here in my slice of Northern VA it's around $2200. I laughed that idea out of existence. Not only is the cost ridiculous, but the standard is questionable. I don't think these kids could compete with your average school/Sunday league side back home. I just don't.

Money isn't the only barrier to youth soccer development, there's also the time commitment required on families of travel teams. Instead of traveling to multiple states during the season, perhaps they should focus more locally and have one big tournament at the end of the season that encompasses multiple states.

When I was 14 I was selected, through a process, to play a tournament in Holland for the U15 National Team (PTPSA). Unfortunately, MY FAMILY COULDN'T AFFORD $5000+ FOR ME TO GO.

Yep. My parents didn't see the point. My Brother had a natural skill with the ball. Started with shooting the ball through the Gaps on latters to improve his accuracy.

Ok I get it. My son plays in Singapore where he doesn’t have to play. He had to to tryout and make the team. They are sponsored by PUma and Shopify. But we did have to pay in his early year. Barcelona,Real Madrid, and Ruro Soccer Leagues. We are American. But in the US the sport is not the number 1 sport. My son will come back to the US and we’ve been told he’s a better chance playing club soccer than highschool soccer. This is not he same in Basketball or Football. So where does the money come from?!!? That’s the question.

My son is 2014 born. Playing in a solid club in Hawaii. $1400 for year round club fees. New kit every 2 years $240. 4 tournaments a year $55 each. Averages to about $150 a month. 3 training sessions a week and weekend games/scrimmage. He loves to play. This club may be the most expensive in the state. Overseas travel maybe once every year or two for those who can make it. We haven’t gone on a trip yet. Hawaii soccer is legit and we could use a pro team.

All you’re doing is complaining. It’s really simple. The money needs to come from somewhere. If you don’t want the families to pay, the programs need sponsorships. The best coaches will want to be compensated fairly. So they’ll go to the money. FYI, this is true in most sports in America (even basketball and baseball)

Is this the key to winning a World Cup? I think it is.

Lots of European coaches making big money in the US youth pay to play system. All about the 💵.

I was hoping for more focus and details on tangible solutions to the problem in this video. To me, it seems like this video was more of "we should make soccer free, we should make coaching licenses less expensive, we should be more like other countries, people are greedy..." rather than what can actually and realistically be done to change. Why didn't you all discuss how Open goal project works? How are they funding free soccer? How can you expand that model? Look, I wish youth sports could be free but it's a problem all across youth sports, not just soccer. Focusing on just soccer, a huge problem that no one mentions when comparing our system against other countries is that soccer is not engrained in our culture like it is elsewhere. Its lack of popularity and history makes it impossible to expect the infrastructure of soccer in this country to be as developed as others. You said it in your video, other countries fund youth soccer through professional clubs. These clubs would have to be supported at a high enough level for them to make enough money to offer youth soccer for free. We don't have that system of professional clubs in this country because we don't have a strong history of soccer and the popularity of soccer isn't strong enough to support the thousands of clubs we would need all around the country. I think one of the best things we can do is to support your local club. It all comes down to the fact that soccer is not popular enough in this country at least not popular enough to follow models like they have in Europe and Brazil. The game has to be more popular where enough money can be funneled down to support free youth programs.

The system isn't that different in Canada. Yes, there are barriers because of this system. But how come grassroots basketball, hockey, and other sports are pay to play and North America produces some of the best athletes in those sports? The system does work but it doesn't for soccer. It is getting better though... one indicator is our players are getting signed overseas to play (Tajon Buchanan to Inter Milan as a recent example)

Inner city school sports funds got cut a decade ago…Charter schools don’t have sports…it’s a suburban image sport rn…. You need kids from tough backgrounds to handle the international game. I’m not saying there aren’t any good suburban players but you need a mix.

i remember 15 years ago when my son was playing soccer in montgomery county, md and the cost for him to play on that team was $700/month + $1000 at the start of the season...lol, the coach was an illegal immigrant from nigeria who drove a brand new mercedes suv. *smfh*

Pay to play is not going away anytime soon. First of all, coaches have to pay for their coaching education and licensing. We need more scholarships for all levels of play. More players who have made it out of our system should really turn back around and start a fund for our programs. Our communities must also start supporting their local clubs by buying tickets and showing up. Currently, my son’s previous coach was earning over 50k per year. He coaches part time and has never won anything. My son was only playing in tournaments. He’s gotten a ton of attention from colleges, but it is hard to know if that’s truly due to his talent or just because they believe we are able to pay for the ID Camps. As parents, we need to help out our local clubs with fund raisers and making soccer visible in our neighborhoods. In vote neighbors, family, and friends. Make it fun.

It’s all about the money 💰

I didn’t expect a "solution" to pay-to-play, but I wish you could've pointed out some realistic sources of funding for soccer programs. Pay-to-play exists because travel soccer and coaching is expensive, and enough parents are willing to shell out a premium to get access to those services. Who is going to pay for the coaching and facilities for millions of kids, if not the parents? What revenue sources are American clubs supposed to tap into that will solve this huge gap? They are usually excluded from solidarity payments, so that's out. Which level of government would be giving the handout, local, State, or Federal? I can't imagine anyone would choose to stake their survival on government funding always being granted year after year. Getting funding from parents at least means you can always pay your bills so long as you can recruit the kids/parents each year. I think that we won't see a reduction in pay-to-play until coaching licenses are easily aquired en-masse and professional clubs proliferate and pump money into partnerships with youth clubs.

Does American football, flag football, baseball, and basketball also have pay to play? If so, then why are they successful?

I’m actually inspired by this video. As someone with a 15-year-old daughter who’s black, and yes did start soccer late two years ago , to go to tryouts with new and old players and see a ratio of 97 to 99% young white girl players, out of about 59-150 prospects, and no one see a problem with this. It’s kind of disgusting. I’ve actually decided to start my own Academy, and this was my first research video confirming my thoughts. I’m glad to see that there are people, particularly white ,who understand something is off. Thank you for the start of a long journey.

So everyone agrees money is the issue and I won't dispute that. Soccer is like #4 on the sports list in the US and until that changes the money train from pro clubs may not change a lot. Most of the European model won't fly here for that reason and for the size differences in our country compare to say England ( size of Ohio ) or Spain and Germany ( Texas is bigger)

If we eliminate government funding as an option (apparently 19% of revenue in Germany… I’m sure taxpayers wouldn’t vote for this) and solidarity payments are finally improving, you only have sponsorships and donations to make up the gap. That’s a huge gap… tbh Sponsorships are hard… 1) clubs have to employ a salesperson to get sponsorships, 2) American small businesses are threatened. How many of them have closed due to the pandemic and rising costs (restaurants), Home Depot, Costco and Amazon? Americans are generally not loyal to buying from their community. 3) businesses generally feel online and TV marketing are more effective than community advertising. As for the biggest percentage “fees”, we’re getting to the point where innocence is losing… American football and basketball have pay-to-play (like AAU) so how can disadvantaged kids afford it??? There are nefarious ways like handlers who don’t have the kids’ best interests and treat them as investments. As MLS and soccer in America get bigger (like better salaries), that’s the direction we are heading. I only hope soccer is preparing for this…

I don't think you understand the economics of soccer in Europe vs US. In every town in Europe, the local club can sell their talented players to a bigger club for huge sums. Selling just one academy product can fund the entire program for a generation. Then there is the trickle down payments made to local clubs from the TV deals sold at the top level. These sources of funding are simply not available to the US youth soccer clubs. There is no chance of getting paid for the talent we create and we get nothing from our association, so we have to charge at the point of delivery. Unless you think the best coaches should work for free, there are no other sources of income except parents.

If better coaching is part of the problem, then the next target needs to be USSF because their licensing courses are grossly overpriced and the content is abysmal. Coach Education in the US is absolutely awful so when you consider that families are paying what they are for such a poor product, it's a massive issue. Great video Jake.

The problem also is these families pay and the kid might not be best and they expect the coach to play them because they are paying. Of course you limiting the pool of talented players from all backgrounds.

Solving the issue with Pay to Play and PR/Rel goes into the same line. Those two issues can be fixed in a dense population city like LA or NY. Once we start talking about places where people need to drive 30 minutes to a city that has a soccer field that's the issue. The reality is that pay-to-play in the USA is not an easy thing to fix. Everything has to be done in school.

The other thing that I can't stand is the ragging on many local high school and middle school level coaches. They do need improvement but lots of times it is that coach or no soccer program. So be a little more respectful. Also, any program that is signing 14 year olds and under to contracts. Kids who cant legally sign contracts I want nothing to do with.

Great Vid. Although at it's premise it's utterly wrong, it does show passion and a ton of work. Any time some says "pay-to-play". What they really mean is, "someone else needs to pay for my children". Seriously, how is it that every other major sport in America can find the "best players" under a similar system and soccer (one of if not the cheapest sports)) can't do the same thing? Yet every "privileged" American needs to be outraged at a system that has worked extremely well for 50ish or 60ish years.

FIFA should flood American inner cities with coaches who teach kids how to play the sport.

Start by calling what it is " Football". That alone is a good start to get paid like Football players in Europe for example.

ZERO OVERSIGHT OF COACHES IS A PROBLEM.

Is youth Baseball cheaper? Youth Hockey? Yout Football?

Imagine paying Top Dollar just for realised that you are losing the match, again...again.... and again.....😅😂

This and no Futsal are the worst. I guess it's becoming "more fair" because kids are increasingly having to pay to play other sports like US football, baseball, etc, as funding is cut. 😂

If pay to play wasn't a thing, USA would have won a major tournament by now.

Thousands 😂 that all? It's easy 5 to 10k. I don't even know with clubs that fly out of state. 💰

I have yet to see those “youth pipeline specialists” to provide good coaching for free. They all talk the talk but when push comes to shove, it’s yeah, please pay me $60/hour for coaching, cause they don’t work for free. What a surprise.

When stocks investment started in the USA, we got the 1929 market crash. Crypto that the Japanese invented, crashed in the USA, USA is only country with a real estate crash. Drugs that cost $5 elsewhere, costs $400 in the USA. You get billed for cleaning your ears thousands of dollars out of pocket in some places. Timeshares only exist in the USA. Private equities are investigating into emergency room services in renowned hospitals and tearing things down. The USA has a greed problem.

Every top player in american soccer paid there way to become who they are, this is why i dont believe usmnt has the best players in there squad, living in a major city in america i seen countless good players that didnt have the funds to pursue a dream

FOREIGNERS MONEY MAKING IDEAS...NEED PASSIONATE AMERICAN COACHES (WITH OVERSIGHT)!

Context always matters. Every sport in the USA is pay to play. Travel teams are paid for by parents and sponsors and fund raisers. This is not unique to the sport of soccer.

I have to disagree with you. Los Angeles is beautiful

Why is High School Soccer not a better route for development... like Basketball, Baseball, Football, etc? And, btw, those sports aren't cheap either.

Infantino is an idiot, but he's right about this

It is difficult to find good coaching EVEN IF YOU PAY FOR IT. Coaching in this country is atrocious. It is too focused on athleticism over development of skills and game IQ. So we end up with great athletes with average skill and shit decision-making.

In the UK it costs about $70 per month for 1 child to play coached soccer. There is a thriving industry of bad coaches who rum terrible set ups.

Is the cost to play soccer so much different than the cost to play other sports in the US? And if so, what is the reason for that? The Europeans subsidize their development programs for soccer. Leagues, tournaments, and travel all take money and time to operate. It's not "greed" to make money operating businesses and services. That's just engaging in the economy. It's claimed that "soccer is a suburban sport" because of "pay-to-play". But there are fees for youth baseball, basketball, and football leagues in the US as well. Why are these not "suburban sports"? Maybe soccer is a "suburban sport" for cultural reasons, not because of "pay-to-play". The local government or community in the US is not going to pay for youth soccer programs like they do in Germany. To expect or demand otherwise is spitting into the wind. Clubs can kick in more money if they think it will be a worthy investment, but it must be understood that the costs of soccer leagues in the US are likely greater than in Europe because the overall population density is lower in the US and the interest in soccer as a percentage of the population is lower, as well. Travel is likely far greater if you want to put together a league matching a comparable talent level as European youth leagues. The revenue and profits of US soccer clubs are much lower than in Europe, as well. So there will be far less money that clubs can justify for youth soccer development in the US. What am I missing here? How is youth soccer in the US so much different from other youth sports? Why is youth soccer in the US being compared to Europe instead of to other sports in the US? The problem with youth soccer development in the US is likely the paucity of soccer expertise at every level of American play except for the very top. In every small town in America you can find multiple people with decent knowledge of baseball, basketball, and football. And the same can be said for soccer in Europe. I'm sure it's as least somewhat better now, but when I was a kid in a small town many of my local U-8 and U-10 coaches didn't know a thing about soccer and learned through books or videos just before taking over as coach. It was far easier to get decent tennis coaching in my town than decent soccer coaching. The demand for competent coaching ability exceeds the supply. There's nothing to be done for that except for the sport to grow organically. If interest in the sport pervades the culture the way it does for the major American sports things will become more local and more competitive and prices will come down. But you can't magically end up with tens of thousands of competent youth coaches spread out across the US just by throwing money around. The only thing you can do, is to concentrate the best coaches at the top academies to get the best development for the youths who have developed interest in the sport and have developed their games to a promising level from whatever lower-level development background they came from. Governments and communities are not going to pay money for those elite soccer programs in the US. Clubs have less money to chip in and less to gain from doing so than in Europe. So parents are going to have to pay market prices for high level coaching and leagues. It's going to be expensive unless and until the breadth of soccer culture catches up somewhat with that of other sports in the US and with that of Europe. It's just inefficient to try to compete with the big boys when you don't have the underlying, organic interest and expertise they have in the big-boy countries.

Most of these kids learn soccer through training, not culture

The root of this problem is not having an open system. In an open system, every community can have a adult team. And when the clubs make $ by selling players or moving up the pyramid, their incentives switch from finding as many rich parents as possible to developing pro players.

He was speaking about the MLS itself 💀

But but if kids were good enough they’d get picked up by academies hurdurrr! (My least favorite argument from people who think this pay to play system isn’t a problem)

Where is your centering, not mentioning via someone else's video, but centering of race in this video? The literal most important factor, and yet...

I wish people would be more explicit about the system being anti-Latino. I grew up in California and live in Texas, and I can tell you that pay to play overwhelmingly effects Latino kids in these places. We need to stop tip toeing around it and just say it’s anti-Latino racism. Otherwise we’ll never solve it

It’s a scam