Park Pirate
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Jan 26, 2016
You were lucky that your soccer experience was honest. My son played soccer competitively for many, many years. Not once did he have to prove his age. I just put his birthdate on the forms. He would show up at tournaments with his U-12 academy team and play a team full of grown men who were a foot taller than him and with a 5:00 shadow. It was disgraceful.
Yeah, you know something is up when your opponents are driving themselves to the game!
Seriously though, our soccer program follows the same player card system that others have described. The use of a calendar year rather than say a September 1 - August 31 year has forced some of my son's class mates (those with birthdays between September and January 1) up to the higher grades team, but for the most part, everyone is on an even playing field. I am sure there are those that cheat the system, but I think it more blatant/deliberate now.
One thing soccer has going for it in our area that lacrosse does not, is the number of kids playing. Soccer tournaments can generally fill divisions that supposedly have all teams with kids born within the same calendar year. While lacrosse is growing, tournaments often have to group 2 years together (used to be U7, U9, U11, and U13, but has been changed to 8U, 10U, 12U, and 14U). Having the 2 years together and using graduation year (supposedly coinciding with the age groups) can lead to some mismatches in the level of the participants.