OPDL: Where Changes Should Be Made

As I've stated before, I think the idea of LTPD and the OPDL are very great in concept, but with that being said, I think there has been a major lack of communication and structural set up by the OSA with all the clubs involved in the process. There are many naysayers out there who appear to want this league to fail, while others think this is the saving grace for Canadian soccer. Where do I stand in this whole situation? Although I'd love to see this league succeed, unless there are changes made by the OSA quickly, I can't see this league obtaining its full purpose. From the majority of talk I am hearing via soccer blogs and twitter there are many flaws currently going on with the process at the moment (I don't know if the talk is all true, but I believe a lot of it is). I'm not going to get into prices, lack of inclusion of academies, demographics and other issues, but I will be talking about where the OSA/Clubs are still failing the players.

If the OPDL is supposed to be a league for Elite players...

When this league was introduced, many individuals believed (and still do) that this league is supposed to be for the "elite" players in the province. If this was the case the OSA failed miserably right from the get go.  Taken right from the OSA page, they describe the league as this:

"OPDL represents young players' early graduation to a genuine high performance training environment, targeting only the top athletes in the province from age groups U13 to U23 with what will be the highest level of competitive youth soccer in Ontario."

With this statement being made by the OSA, for the league to be truly for the top athletes, the way they granted teams should have been completely differently. If they wanted it to be for the "top players" (I find it a bit hard to claim 12/13 year olds are "top level players", then this league should have moved away from clubs being appointed teams, but instead ran as a district league. What this would allow for is to players from teams an opportunity to play relatively close to home (depending on district size),  provide clubs with an opportunity to pride themselves on how many players they could promote to the next level, costs could be unified being supplemented by clubs in that district having to pay some of their district fees to the program (they already give money from registrations to the district), and for the larger districts they could possibly have 2 teams.

Despite the OSA claiming that this is for the top athletes, they contradict themselves in other documents as they say that this league is about development of the player. With the development of the player being the focus of the league, from what is being talked about by individuals from the Ontario soccer world, then the clubs are failing from this aspect.

OPDL, the Developmental League...

With rumours circulating that many clubs are struggling to find players, and more importantly RELEASING players, clubs are failing, and despite the focus being about "development" the old problem of wanting the best players currently still exist. For those that follow me on twitter, you may know that sometimes Jason De Vos and I don't always see eye to eye on things, but yesterday we did come to an agreement on one major issue. After having a back and forth discussion I tweeted: 

"If it's about elite training then coaches should, be taking almost any decent player willing to join the program" 

Jason agreed with statement, and provided quite possibly the best response to what these clubs should be doing with 

"You are absolutely spot on. It's not about the kids who are currently "the best". It's about the ones if want to be.  

I couldn't agree with this anymore, if clubs are receiving players who want to get better by receiving elite training year round, and these coaches who were hired are really good at developing players based on their qualifications, then they shouldn't be releasing players (they obviously have to have a bit of skill), but instead they should be taking them in to develop these players so that the talent pool can increase. The problems of "low numbers" could be resolved by this.

Why are coaches supposedly releasing so many players that are wanting to join the program? Is it possible that despite results not mattering in this league, coaches and clubs still want to get a WINNING team on the pitch?

Conclusion:

With the OPDL season slated to begin soon, the OSA and all the clubs need to make some changes to how this is being ran in order for it to operate properly. With development supposed to be the main focus of the league, players shouldn't be turned away, but instead embraced and taken in so that they can further their development so that in the long run they can actually produce some "elite" players in the future.