see, there it is... "especially the upper class or bourgeoise"... I'm with you on the "we need to develop players from all socioeconomic backgrounds", but Foucault as the magic solution to the Whitecaps' problems... not so much...
Football is really the ballet of the working classes. The best players come from those sectors of society. Yes, you will find the rare exceptions like Pirlo, Kaka, Pique, Redondo, and few others. I agree that those with privileged with money should have the opportunity to play too, but those guys sooner or later take themselves out of the competition. It is really tough to be a professional football player. For example, Kendall Watson and Cristian Techera (some of the best players from the Whitecaps) do not come from the upper classes in Latin America. Guys from the upper and middle classes simply do not have the grit to REALLY compete in a soccer field.see, there it is... "especially the upper class or bourgeoise"... I'm with you on the "we need to develop players from all socioeconomic backgrounds", but Foucault as the magic solution to the Whitecaps' problems... not so much...
Football is really the ballet of the working classes. The best players come from those sectors of society. Yes, you will find the rare exceptions like Pirlo, Kaka, Pique, Redondo, and few others. I agree that those with privileged with money should have the opportunity to play too, but those guys sooner or later take themselves out of the competition. It is really tough to be a professional football player. For example, Kendall Watson and Cristian Techera (some of the best players from the Whitecaps) do not come from the upper classes in Latin America. Guys from the upper and middle classes simply do not have the grit to REALLY compete in a soccer field.
It does not matter. This is just for fun kid.Soccer coach
In all seriousness and honesty I ask - what do you do for a living?
Football is really the ballet of the working classes. The best players come from those sectors of society. Yes, you will find the rare exceptions like Pirlo, Kaka, Pique, Redondo, and few others. I agree that those with privileged with money should have the opportunity to play too, but those guys sooner or later take themselves out of the competition. It is really tough to be a professional football player. For example, Kendall Watson and Cristian Techera (some of the best players from the Whitecaps) do not come from the upper classes in Latin America. Guys from the upper and middle classes simply do not have the grit to REALLY compete in a soccer field.
You tend to get a bit carried away at times, but on this I am in 100% agreement, but that's nothing new. Ever since the HPL (now BCPL) came out with their extremely high "pay to play" model, I've been staunchly against it.
Everyone in this game in this country wants to develop it to ultimately compete in the World Cup. In order to do so, there needs to be a means of reaching / identifying the best players from all sectors, regardless of their social / economic standings. There also needs to be a carrot, motivation to create the burning desire to "get there". This isn't a revelation; it's a common theme across all professional sports, basketball maybe being the most relevant and immediate example. Currently, we have a system where- at the top of the youth pyramid- we have limited the opportunities only to the upper middle class and higher, and to make matters more difficult, we have almost no opportunities for those top end players to play professionally in this country.
The Whitecaps have shown by their actions they are not a club providing opportunities to Canadian players. Hell, even when our one poster child came through with a very good performance on Saturday, he was yanked early for a player that- for lack of a better description- is a poor, expensive signing.
I've said it before and I'll say it again...if I'm an athletic kid growing up in Central Whaley, and my immigrant parents don't have two nickels to rub together because they are busy working 2 or 3 jobs to but food on the table, I'm choosing to play basketball, not soccer. With 2000 Universities in the US, plus some very good CIS schools here, basketball can at the very least give you a pathway to a very good education, then possibly the NBA or European professional leagues. All for next to no costs, just some shoes and a ball, as the school system takes care of the lion's share of the costs.
We have the identification and top end playing model completely backwards here, and we'll never identify the real diamonds in the rough the way we do things now.
Back to supporting the Caps, @Soccer Coach, I suspect there is a shitty hometown team that you support, for better or worse, wherever it is you actually come from. Either South America or Europe. For a lot of us, that's what the Caps are; they are what we had when we were kids, and all we had. I remember how huge they were when I was 5, we'd actually sing "White is the Color, Soccer is the Game" in kindergarten during circle time. Players would come to the school. There were free clinics everywhere. Carl Valentine was my favorite player only because he was working a booth at Lougheed Mall, and showed me how to strike a ball (naturally, I blame him). I rode my bike down there from Austin & Hickey just to see them. That kind of stuff develops long term, undying loyalty. No matter how backwards the current regime is running things...and indeed, they are completely out to lunch. It's just almost impossible for a lot of us to not care.
Soccer coach
In all seriousness and honesty I ask - what do you do for a living?
In limited fairness to the BCSPL, and to soccer generally, on the womens' side many BCSPL players end up with good scholarships to play good soccer both stateside and here in Canada...
Back in the pre-BCSPL days, I was involved with the Burnaby Selects. We had no technical director, paid our coaches honorariums only (which covered gas if they were lucky), had the smallest catchment area of any metro league club, and, being centrally located, were quite vulnerable to losing "out of districts" to multiple neighbouring clubs "coughevilmetrofordcough"... yet, our teams were all sniffing around the top of the table on a sustained basis...
why? because we charged $500 for the year, inclusive of everything. the recent immigrant from Africa who settles in southeast Burnaby? what sport might they have a passing familiarity with? $2000 plus plus isn't happening; $500 reduced by kidsport / other hardship money? now we're talking...
I can tell you with absolute certainty that a lot of our hardship players were also some of our best players... although we did our best to bring them along to the BCSPL and keep the pipeline / hardship support open, you're just not going to capture the same number of players of modest means when the sticker price is what it is... one day, hopefully, we'll learn that lesson...