Texas Cup 2013

Let the fun begin:

http://events.gotsport.com/events/results.aspx?EventID=34470&Gender=Girls&Age=10

6 game schedule, should be some great matches.

Six games for little bodies playing adult-sided soccer on oversized fields? This is one of the more counter-developmental scenarios possible. The older select girls are guaranteed only three games, which is appropriate and expected. How was this ever approved?

For eight and nine year old girls to be pushed too soon into 11v11 and onto fields much too large for their small bodies is bad enough. But to then schedule them to play essentially two tournaments in three days is borderline abusive and is putting, admittedly or not, children at risk.

Shame on Sting for doing this.

7 games in a weekend for winner and runner up. Hope they didn't have too much turkey and pumpkin pie the day before!

banana kick wrote:Six games for little bodies playing adult-sided soccer on oversized fields?  This is one of the more counter-developmental scenarios possible.  The older select girls are guaranteed only three games, which is appropriate and expected.  How was this ever approved?

For eight and nine year old girls to be pushed too soon into 11v11 and onto fields much too large for their small bodies is bad enough.  But to then schedule them to play essentially two tournaments in three days is borderline abusive and is putting, admittedly or not, children at risk.

Shame on Sting for doing this.

I agree with you on all points. But shame on Sting... only? Sure, it's absolutely brainless to put kids in a position to have to play games at 8:00, 11:00, and 2:00 on day one and then 9:30, 12:30, and 4:00 on day two (plus a potential finals match). Every bit of research has clearly pointed to the insanity of how soccer tournaments are run. Even US Soccer took a stand against it all several years ago by making recommendations for the maximum number of minutes per day kids should play according to their age: http://www.socceramerica.com/article/51792/the-perils-of-tournament-play-how-to-cope.html .

But Sting - like many, many other clubs out there - is selling a product. Sadly, so are most coaches. They don't have to play the games; they just have to kill a weekend standing on the sideline shouting instruction... and they are getting paid to do it by the parents who demand more and more tournaments. Like the coaches, it's not the parents who are playing. I've yet to see a parent tear an ACL due to watching too many games. Where is the common sense?

Just a hunch but I bet this is fixed this week...

Perhaps they go with "mini-game" format of 20min halves each game?

6 games @ 40min/game = 240 total min
4 games @ 60min/game = 240 total min

bwgophers wrote:Perhaps they go with "mini-game" format of 20min halves each game?

6 games @ 40min/game = 240 total min
4 games @ 60min/game = 240 total min

Or perhaps 12 games @ 20 minutes each.

FriscoSoccer05 wrote:Just a hunch but I bet this is fixed this week...

I hope you and Gophers are right. I'm pretty sure a lot of parents don't fully realize how taxing a soccer game is. As a kid growing up in the Dallas club soccer environment, tournaments were few and far between. I remember only doing two per season more often than not. But here's something that is crystal clear in my mind about playing every single soccer game I've ever done: All of them left me horrendously sore the next day. I can remember being in high school in peak condition and still hurting after a single soccer match. It genuinely is that demanding at the higher level. It was written somewhere that the average player covers about 6 miles in a 90 minutes game. Some of that is walking, some jogging, and some high speed sprinting. It is an amazingly challenging sport.

True, soccer is very physically demanding, hence the showcase teams are playing one game per day. Not to mention the college coaches tire from watching a few matches a day. #firstworldproblems

BleedFutbol wrote:True, soccer is very physically demanding, hence the showcase teams are playing one game per day. Not to mention the college coaches tire from watching a few matches a day. #firstworldproblems

An orthopedic surgeon friend has 3 words for this issue: cumulative stress injuries. They often don't truly manifest until HS or College. He feels a large percentage of the kids who don't get past the 1st or 2nd year in College ball fall victim to this.

Unfortunately there is no definitive study to confirm this, so the 5-6 full game weekends will continue.....

Gunner9 wrote:

BleedFutbol wrote:True, soccer is very physically demanding, hence the showcase teams are playing one game per day. Not to mention the college coaches tire from watching a few matches a day. #firstworldproblems

An orthopedic surgeon friend has 3 words for this issue:  cumulative stress injuries.  They often don't truly manifest until HS or College.  He feels a large percentage of the kids who don't get past the 1st or 2nd year in College ball fall victim to this.  

Unfortunately there is no definitive study to confirm this, so the 5-6 full game weekends will continue.....

Rumor has it they already have a fix in the works...

and the revision is posted  

tpitty wrote:and the revision is posted  

And why do they insist on playing so many games on Friday... Seriously annoying.   You have a whole Saturday and Sunday to work with...

Especially considering they went from 6 to 7 games down to 3 to 5 games max... seems logical everyone would get fewer Friday games...  

Kudos to Sting for making needed changes and doing so quickly and thoughtfully.

40% chance of rain on Sunday- maybe that is influencing the scheduling.

FriscoSoccer05 wrote:

tpitty wrote:and the revision is posted  

And why do they insist on playing so many games on Friday...  Seriously annoying.   You have a whole Saturday and Sunday to work with...  

Especially considering they went from 6 to 7 games down to 3 to 5 games max... seems logical everyone would get fewer Friday games...   

Stop crying! 

Good games today. Our 05s are doing pretty well playing up. Looking forward to more tomorrow.

TatonkaBurger wrote:Good games today. Our 05s are doing pretty well playing up. Looking forward to more tomorrow.

fields are definitely set up for the 05's. The 04 coaches i talked to were saying how the 9v9 fields were taking quite a bit to get adjusted too. Glad the 05s are showing well tho  

tpitty wrote:

TatonkaBurger wrote:Good games today. Our 05s are doing pretty well playing up. Looking forward to more tomorrow.

fields are definitely set up for the 05's. The 04 coaches i talked to were saying how the 9v9 fields were taking quite a bit to get adjusted too. Glad the 05s are showing well tho  

Agree, anytime you can score off a throw in, the fields are definitely too small...

[quote="intrinsic"]40% chance of rain on Sunday- maybe that is influencing the scheduling.[/quote]No the Truth is that (LM) the new lady that took over tournaments this year for Sting has never done this and indeed was a learning experience for her but she was able to adjust with the help of the fabulous Staff at Sting.

I just hope my daughters team should have been put in a bracket where they could have competed instead of getting our tales whipped! we were told there would be a 05 pure bracket with a silver division and we ended up playing with mixed 04 teams.

wrongsided wrote:

intrinsic wrote:40% chance of rain on Sunday- maybe that is influencing the scheduling.

No the Truth is that (LM) the new lady that took over tournaments this year for Sting has never done this and indeed was a learning experience for her but she was able to adjust with the help of the fabulous Staff at Sting.

I just hope my daughters team should have been put in a bracket where they could have competed instead of getting our tales whipped! we were told there would be a 05 pure bracket with a silver division and we ended up playing with mixed 04 teams.

which team is that? I thought everyone competed pretty nicely, especially considering the guest players and small sized fields. Sorry if you guys were misbracketed, but from the games I watched--which ended up being quite a few, I didn't see any team that was just flat out over matched.