Welcome to the scuff podcast where we talk about U.S. soccer.

Our guest today just spent a few days in Philadelphia at the United Soccer Coaches Convention.

He's the executive editor of Soccer America, probably the national go-to guy on the structure

of the sport in this country and the state of youth soccer.

Mike Waitala, welcome back to scuffed.

That's great to be back.

You had a memorable appearance on NPR back in 2006 where you imagined a playground scene where kids are lined up

for the monkey bars and adult is standing next to the sandbox shouting dig dig so you

were it was it was very well done you were arguing for fewer drills and less screaming in youth soccer practice.

How are we doing on that front? It very much depends on where you're at, what feels you're at.

You know, I would one thing, one area of progress I think we can point to is some of the coaching education that comes out of U.S. soccer, you know,

and if you go to a bigger club where they understand that there are stages of development,

including when children need to explore the game on their own terms, you'll have that kind of

culture where the coaches of the younger kids know that you shouldn't be screaming at them

and then the parents, right? You have to monitor the parents

and, you know, I notice

this refereeing.

Some clubs are able to, you know,

enforce the idea that you're not supposed to

scream at the kids a whole time. You're not supposed

to coach them from the sideline.

I've refereed games where you, you know, you got like a 24-year-old coach on the sideline. On another side line, you've got a bunch of adults screaming out there at the 10-year-olds. And the 24-year-old doesn't know how to, you know, tell them to shut up. So there's a lot of challenges. So I think there's always going to be an issue with that.

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