Travel Soccer - Fall 2008 Update

The 2008 season is under way and the club is excited about our teams and the support that we enjoy from the community. However, I would like to take this opportunity to address any family that is considering travel soccer.

Travel soccer is for players who desire to compete at a higher level of play and prepare themselves for the high school level and beyond. Attendance at practice, training sessions, and league games is required. Many of our players are excellent athletes and compete in multiple sports. However, if players truly want to become better soccer players then a commitment is essential from both the players and their parents to their team, their coach, and to our program. We cannot have players missing soccer sessions during the months of July & August when preparations are at their peak for the start of the fall season. There are players who play summer intramural basketball and players who play fall baseball. If that is what they want to do or if that is what their parents want them to do then that is fine…but you can't do both if it interferes with travel soccer. A family decision must be made at this point. It is not fair to our primarily volunteer coaches or to those players who do make every effort to attend. We are not talking about 3-4 nights per week…2 nights is typical. My hope is that players and families will choose soccer as their primary fall sport.

We would like to welcome our new U-13 girl's premier team to our program. We also welcome new coaches Joe DiRenzi (U-9 girls) and Chris Stulb (U-9 boys). This brings us to a total of 16 travel teams going into the 2008-09 fall season. We have nine girl's teams (U-9, U-10, U-12A, U-12B, U-13 Premier, U-14A, U-14B, U-15A, U-15B) and seven boy's teams (U-9, U-10, U-11, U-12, U-13, U-14, U-15). All of our girl's teams play in PAGS (Philadelphia Area Girls Soccer) while we have five teams in Inter-County Soccer League and two teams in DELCO Soccer League. We have several very strong teams who play at a high level and this is mainly because of the dedication of the players plus their family's commitment to soccer along with dedicated and expert coaches and trainers.
While we have a strong program, we can make it stronger by gathering additional support from our local governments for field expansion, additional support from our parents and players, and adding more volunteers. The majority of SAHS players (boys and girls) come through our program and that is our goal…to develop players capable of playing at the high school level and beyond. Last year we had over 20 players receive some type of college soccer scholarship and our club is very proud of their accomplishment.

We will also be expanding our fundraising efforts as a club to expand and improve our development programs for both coaches and players so please lend your support whenever possible. Most importantly is WE NEED MORE VOLUNTEERS so please, ask your coach how you can help!

Finally, while wins and losses are not our main focus, if we can train and teach our coaches and players both the needed skills along with true sportsmanship, the winning seems to take care of itself. Most importantly though, is that players should play at a level that is dictated by their abilities. Plus, it's LOTS OF FUN!

We truly appreciate the support we have received and we look forward once again to another successful year in travel soccer!

For more information, contact: Jack Stacy, Travel Program Director (215-256-0195 or jstacy@comcast.net)