U.S. Soccer Driven Age Level Changes
Information for Coaches, Parents and Families
AGENDA
• Review information from MYSA and U.S. Soccer
• Review related WBSC decisions/policies
Who is making these decisions?
• U.S. Soccer, the National Governing Body for soccer in the USA
• Mandated = every youth soccer org. will comply
• e.g. U.S. Youth Soccer (incl. MYSA), U.S. Club Soccer, AYSO, etc.
• Not an MYSA or club decision IF it will happen, just HOW to manage changes
Clubs
What is changing?
• Switch from Aug-Jul to Jan-Dec (“Birth-year”) registration
• New Small-Sided Game Standards
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7v7 at U9/10 and 9v9 at U11/12 (currently 6v6 and 8v8)
Offside added at U9/10
Field size and Goal size changes
Build-out line to encourage playing out of the back, i.e. “good” soccer
When is this happening?
• Fall 2016 – Birth-Year Registration
• All 55 U.S. Youth Soccer state associations
• MYSA Leagues, State Cup, MRL, Regionals, U.S. Youth Soccer National Championship
• Fall 2017 – Small-Sided Game Standards
• MYSA (other states may implement earlier)
What isn’t changing
• Soccer Seasonal Calendar: Fall-to-Summer
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Player tryouts/evaluations can begin in late July
Fall MYSA league and State Tournament (Aug-Oct)
Summer MYSA league and State Tournament (Apr-Jul)
MN State Cup  Region II Champ.  US Youth National Champ. (Apr-Jul)
• Age groups still termed “U#” nationally in the overall structure. May
be simpler to refer to birth-year within a season, e.g. the “2003’s”
• Olympic Development Program (ODP) stays birth-year as it has been
• Soccer remains a great game for kids
Why the changes?
• U.S. Soccer wants to improve the youth soccer environment
• More individual development focus vs. a team result culture
• Fully implement small-sided games across USA with consistent
standards
• Align player registration with international standards
• Simplify identification of “relative age effect” bias
• RAE = Selecting players born earlier within a group due to physical maturity
Birth-Year Challenges
• Aug-Dec players become younger within their new age group
• They “leapfrog” an age group in the transition year (2016-17)
• U14 Aug-Dec players (older 8th graders) may have player pool
shortage every fall to form 11v11 teams
• Due to high school play for Jan-Jul birthday players
• Team formation and league placement are challenges in the transition
period
What can parents/families do?
• Be accurately informed - Chain of communication
• Families
Club leaders
MYSA
U.S. Youth Soccer and U.S. Soccer
• Keep the big picture in mind
• National standardization affects all individuals, clubs, and states
• Be supportive of club leadership – no easy solutions
• Control what you can (and accept what you can’t)
• Remember: Not a club decision IF it will happen, just HOW to manage changes
• Reassure your child that s/he can adapt to these changes
• Same for everyone
Related White Bear Soccer Club policies
• NONE of these changes affect WBSC teams/players for upcoming 2016
summer season
• WBSC conducted many discussions on how to best implement age
level changes starting in fall 2016
• Sought input from other clubs and reviewed MYSA poll results of how
clubs plan to implement
• Resulted in WBSC establishing the following 5 policies/decisions
1) When to implement birth year play
(e.g. Recreational vs. Competitive)
WBSC will implement the following age level standards starting with the
fall 2016 soccer season:
• Play soccer by birth year as soon as players enter club, even at Rec, to get
families used to birth year concept from the start
• While not encouraged, to not restrict families from signing up for “play up”
year in Recreational
• Play up for Competitive players need to follow the stipulations stated under item #4 below
Reason:
Providing families with flexibility during Rec soccer would allow more
families/kids to A) start soccer, B) keep playing soccer.
2) Decision between A) split age level fall
vs. summer, or B) same age level
MYSA allows both options for flexibility
WBSC will go with option B
Reason:
Option A would require WBSC to reform
teams mid soccer year (during winter)
for 2 age levels that move field sizes
between fall and spring – see items
marked in chart A below. Also, MYSA
even states it makes most sense to play
entire soccer year in the summer age
group.
2) Decision between A) split age level fall
vs. summer, or B) same age level
Per MYSA:
The seasons are broken down individually because if you have fallonly players they may play in an age group based on that fall’s
calendar year. For those who play fall and summer, it might make
most sense to group them for the entire soccer year based on
their summer age group. Technically they would play up in the fall
but it's likely many other clubs/teams will do the same. If your club
decides to place a team at their actual age group in the fall and
move up an age group for the summer season, be aware that from
U10-U11 and from U12-U13 that means playing a bigger game
with a bigger roster needed.
3) Support teams to stay together, or
enforce play at their age level
There has been interest by some coaches to keep entire teams together
and move them up to a certain age level. The WBSC has decided not allow
coaches to keep entire teams together.
Players will go through evaluations as individual players by age level for the
purpose of accurate team formation by new age level standards.
Reason:
Allowing whole teams to stay together would dilute player pools. For
example, if a current U12 team (2003/2004 birth year) is allowed to keep
the team together then the pool of 2004 players is reduced, so that the
current U11 2004 players may not A) have enough players to form
competitive teams, or B) not have enough players to form teams at all.
4) Play up policies
For the fall of 2016 the WBSC has adopted the following play up stipulations:
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Allow opportunity to play up
Player has to try out for actual age level first
Player can try out for additional age level(s) without additional evaluation charges
In order to play at age level up the player needs to make the following based on evaluations:
• For U9/U10, the player needs to be in the top 6 overall for the age level up
• For U11/U12, the player needs to be in the top 8 overall for the age level up
• For U13 and above, the player needs to be in the top 11 overall for the age level up
• If player does not make top team of age level up (C1 or Maroon) then player must play at
actual age level
Reason:
If WBSC does not put restrictions on making the top team, as well as the top # of
players of the age level up, the concern is, as mentioned under item #3, that player
pools would become diluted due to too many players attempting to play up, which in
turn would hurt entire age groups.
5) What to do with U14 Aug-Dec players
in the fall
Aug-Dec players in that birth-year will be 9th graders playing school soccer
and there may not be enough 8th graders to form a fall U14 team.
WBSC has appointed Edi Buro (DOC) to be responsible for the following:
• Communicate with other clubs regarding their plans for these players, to see if there is
common ground with direction and possibly league play opportunities
• Work with MYSA to try to get official policies/league opportunities set up
Reason:
• WBSC can’t make a decision in vacuum so we need to get a better understanding of
what other clubs are looking at doing.
• Per MYSA: MYSA will want to know if players are not getting the chance to play and if
we should implement solutions on a state-wide level.
WBSC Resources
• Age level information (including birth year / age level chart) has been
posted on WBSC Age Level webpage – see URL below
• Navigate to webpage the following ways:
• Click “upcoming age level changes” news article under Current Activities on WBSC home page
• From WBSC website, use the top navigation: Home > News & Events > Age Level Changes
• Age Level webpage includes link to form where questions can be
submitted to the Club
http://www.whitebearsoccer.org/page/show/2122217-us-soccer-driven-age-level-changes