Rangerforever
Well-Known Member
FVSL
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Premier RUMOUR: Surrey Utd. to FVSL
- Thread starter Canucks4Ever
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SmartCoach
Well-Known Member
No other team will leave
Please do not lose sleep over this
We just need to have on line registration and ref reports on line no more wasting every ones time
At the VMSL office all that gas wasted by every one
Online registration this September
No more excuses
jimmy_jones
Well-Known Member
You forgot the biggest one, standardized match balls and then you've got a level playing field
According to the office if there is a playoff game it would be between the second place teams from div 2 a and b. That would be strikers and normal who each finished with 50 pts. Norvan finished ahead of Campo based on the rule 6.4b. That's where if 2 teams r tied in a div it is decided by rule 5.3. U read that rule 5.3a it says the team with more points between the 2 teams is on top. That would be Norvan as Campo took only 1 pt in the 2 games.
I mean let's be real, getting lured in by a second tier brand like Umbro is true desperation. If it's not Adidas or Nike I won't even look at it. Second tier league second tier gear.
All jokes aside Dude I don't think you really need to ask what tipped the scales for Surrey United to leave. combine that with the geographical reasons, the old guard moving on and what I've heard is 8-10 guys at 1 day a week sessions. I expect a very young team much like the West Van boys to be entering the premier division.
I think the Valley is doing a lot of things right, the details(sponsorship, events, user friendly) these things help create community and a feeling of professionalism. However the reality is VMSL has the history and the prestige, people want to tell their friends they play in the VMSL. That is why the have the quality and will continue to. The stuff they have to catch up on is nothing in my opinion, simple fixes. Much harder then finding 15 quality top tier teams which the VMSL have.
Deal.
This will be a somewhat quick remark. The FVSL simply better suits our needs going forward to establish some sustainability and hopefully a seamless pathway for our youth players into our premier team. Although we have always managed to put a very competitive team on the pitch, it's been an exhausting challenge at times. We have pushed so many of our youth players to CAPS and universities, we are left unmanned until they are done their other commitments and relying on our nucleus of adult players who also have life commitments. The FVSL does have high quality teams, perhaps not the level of the VMSL (yet), but certainly competitive that our SU team will not have a gimme! Many of these FVSL teams are composed of loyal and high quality players who will always be able to compete. Some of these "unknown" players always surprise as they develop like typical Canadian youth, and establish themselves in their early twenties.The logistics of the FVSL blend in well with the way we manage our U17-18 programming to mesh in with our adult programming, and will help establish a core of true SU club players who will be committed to their club for their playing careers. We have one of the few remaining pure "club" systems, cradle to grave. We don't want to get caught up in the "which league is better" stuff. It's a moot point. The demographics of a large community like Surrey are firmly established for us to make this move, stay closer to home, and also help establish the FVSL, the league we left and now have come back home too. The VMSL is a great league with some fantastic people who have established it. We are grateful for the opportunity to play in that league.
Best of luck to all going forward!
Best of luck to all going forward!
Rangerforever
Well-Known Member
Hear Hear
- Admin
- #114
I'm hearing this is a pretty popular post in outside circles.
Clearly someone didn't get enough ice cream as a kid (but has made up for it in spades now)
robbie wilson
New Member
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Some thoughts on these significant developments:
- Massive coup for the FVSL to land a perennial soccer powerhouse of a club like Surrey United. I don't blame the FVSL or any league for that matter in their efforts to improve their calibre. I just hope there aren't any backroom deals. Transparency really is crucial for any league, board, committee or governing body.
- Ironic it was only a few years ago Surrey United was against leaving the VMSL for the so called Super League because the calibre of play was stronger with the status quo.
- Why do we play the game? Presumably to play in the highest and best level of competition. I also presume that is why Surrey United came over...err...were given a spot in the VMSL Premier division in the late 90's
- Is having registrations paid for, new kit and prize money all it takes for a deal like this to be consummated? Based solely on that It puzzles me how any rationale executive committee can say "sign me up". There has to be more.
- Geography: With the existing Fraser Valley based teams in the VMSL almost 66% of Surrey United's games were played in "The Valley". They travelled outside of their region for only 8 of 22 games.
- Depletion of players to Caps and Universities and work committments: Several clubs deal with these same scenarios. Players having to juggle between work commitments and play is a constant in amateur soccer that all teams deal with.
- I really hope the lure of an "easier" provincial cup spot is not a factor in this decision.
- Good luck to Surrey United and time will tell if this decision is in the best interest of their youth/players.
Canucks4Ever
Well-Known Member
- Thread starter
- #119
Agree on your point re transparency, certainly plenty of rumours of backroom deals and money changing hands either directly or indirectly. Surrey has come out and stated their reasons for leaving and we should be able to take them at face value, yet the rumours persist. Perhaps just sour grapes/pot stirring by other teams, but certainly the explaination does seem, for lack of a better word, incomplete. Likely the reason these rumours fester on is because it does feel like their should be more to the answer. Balls, uniforms and alleged prize money don't seem to be enough as @Sandman points out. Centainly the geography reasoning has been proven to be irrelevant.
So I think everyone is waiting for the big reveal, and it's likely never coming. Whether it was a war of words/opinions between VMSL and the new management at SU, monetary considerations, administraitive issues or some combination there in. Reading the comments here from SU though, I'm leaning towards perhaps a new line of thinking myself, that being perhaps Surrey is winding down their adult program and will no longer be the perrennial powerhouse it once was.
The reality is the calibre of the team will be determined not by the league or the executive management, but by the players on the field. Word on the street is the majority of SU's top level players will be looking to stay in the VMSL. Surrey will no doubt likely be competitive anyway in the FVSL, but let's be honest, the Valley is not getting the fourth place team in the VMSL as a whole, it will be a watered down version and that will likely fit nicely into the current top 4 hierarchy in the FVSL.
Surrey has been off the pace at the top of the VMSL for a few years now (a glance back through these forums will show several discussions over the past few seasons regarding how SU are not quite the same calibre they used to be), though they always seem to turn it on down the stretch. Their pedigree alone always makes them a dodgey draw in Provs, however, as it was pointed out, managing this can be absolutely exhausting. Without the bastians of the past leading the charge at SU, particlarly Martin Foden, much of the work falls to the hands of others who either are not as passionate, or simply cannot devote the resources to the program that are required to compete at the top level.
Ultimately the switch allows Surrey to be less invested in their men's program, while still maintaining an A level team with opportunities to qualify for the Provincial Cup. The standard of play in the FVSL, while hopefully improving with the addition of another established program, will allow for more inclusion of younger players or those that do not quite make college teams, etc. This should make recruitment easier, hopefully foster an improved training environment and could potentially one day grow into a new generation of standard bearers for the Surrey United program. Will they win the Provincial Cup next season? No. In the next few seasons? I highly doubt it. One day, with a matured core of players who have been playing in Surrey United colours all their life and will go through a brick wall for their teammates and that crest? I think that's the goal here.
At the end of this, to me it's not actually about the FVSL "stealing" a team, it's about SU saying we don't have what we need to be at our best in the VMSL so let's make this change now while the additional benefits mentioned are on the table, instead of slowly bleeding out over the next decade. The FVSL get an established, historical team to use as the cornerstone of their league for the future, SU gets a chance to slowly rebuild their program in a sustainable way in a new environment and the VMSL gets to go on being the league with the highest level of competition.
To me, this is the answer to the riddle. For all the reasons we have pointed out, it would not make sense for a top level team to leave the VMSL (ie Pegasus), but I think Surrey is signaling that internally they have decided they cannot be a top level team for much longer given their current environment and the time is right to make the change and start over in a new setting. What the decision has done is acted as a catalyst for the VMSL to address some of their own internal shortcomings and let's hope for the sake of soccer in this Province that they do make some adjustments as a result. Thus far the reaction of the VMSL has been less than ideal, with a combination of finger pointing and hand wringing, but now that the dust is settling I would expect them to consolidate, make a few changes and then crack on.
As for having three Div 1 teams come up, I would usually agree that this cannot be the best for the viability of the league, however after this particular season I will disagree. The VMSL Div 1 league had an extraordinarly competitive season and featured some wonderfully talented teams in the top half. When you look at the three teams poised to come up (Westside and Columbus who were coming up anyway, along with North Delta now, assuming no playoff scenarios) you have two teams who have been historically major players in the VMSL Premier division and BC Soccer as a whole, one rebuilt and trending upwards after finishing the season with 10 straight wins and one who is only a season removed from be a Premier team anyway. Then in North Delta you have a hungry team that was a Provincial Cup semi finalist and perrennial FVSL powerhouse that missed promotion based on a draw on the last day of the season. So I think the level of competition will be just fine.
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