Youth Soccer in Madrid and Minnesota: A Parent’s Comparison
An article by guest author Daniel Menken
My three sons (ages 10, 10, and 9) love soccer and have played on
Woodbury traveling teams for several years. The boys attend a Spanish
immersion elementary school and when the opportunity arose for a
full-year exchange to Madrid they jumped at it and couldn’t wait to join
a Spanish futbol team – after all, Spain is on top of the soccer world:
World Cup champs, European champs, and Champions League champs. My wife
and three boys left Minnesota last August and will return next summer.
Spanish soccer has been great for my family. The nine month youth
season began a week before school in September and my boys immediately
found a group of friends among kids and my wife among other soccer moms
and dads. I visited my family in Madrid for ten days over Thanksgiving –
seeing two Saturday matches, four practices, and a piano recital – and
came away impressed with Spanish soccer.
EVERYTHING ABOUT FUTBOL IS MORE INTENSE
There are well over 200 youth soccer clubs in greater Madrid. (The
Comunidad de Madrid has 6.5 million people in 8,000 square kilometers –
compared to 3.2 million people in the 12 county Minneapolis-St Paul area
in 16,000 square kilometers – roughly twice as many people in half as
much space.)
Many clubs are huge, fielding teams from 8 year olds up through
professionals. Real Madrid (Cristiano Ronaldo’s team) is one of these
clubs, as are other La Liga teams like Getafe and Atletico Madrid. My
boys’ local club – Club Futbol de Pozuelo de Alarcon – has 28 teams
culminating in the men’s second division.
The youth season for my boys is nine months long, from the beginning
of September to the end of May, followed by tournaments in June. There
are 26 Saturday match days and 3 pre-season Saturday matches. Games
are only on Saturdays. The Minnesota Youth Soccer Association has only
10 summer games and 6 fall games, often times with multiple games per
week because of the shorter season.
Besides Saturday game-days there are three 90 minute team practices on school nights for ten year olds.
My boys’ team has two adult paid coaches.
Teams have boys with a two-year age span (10 and 11 year olds on my boys’ team) rather than a single year as in Minnesota.
Teams play eleven-a-side beginning with 10 year olds and games are 60 minutes long.
Games have one adult referee compared to a typically youthful referee and two side judges in MYSA.
One of the most striking differences was that all clubs I visited
have beautiful artificial turf fields. Each club I saw has three full
fields with seating for up to 800 spectators. Fields are always in
perfect condition. They are essentially carpets with one-eighth inch
knap for perfect ball control. Although it never rained during my visit,
my boys tell me there is no puddling even in downpours. Fields are
equipped with water sprinklers used in summer to keep the fields cool.
My boys enjoyed practicing with the sprinklers on in September.
All fields I visited have superb night lighting. Evening practices are under the lights.
The number of boys participating in Madrid traveling soccer is high –
by my calculation there are 5,000 Madrid boys born in each year in
competitive soccer – that’s 770 boys per calendar year of birth per
million inhabitants. My calculations for MYSA boys in the Twin Cities
metropolitan area is just under 1,500 boys per calendar year of birth –
or 460 boys per calendar year per million inhabitants. That’s 770 Madrid
boys compared to 460 Minnesota boys. The obvious explanation for the
difference is the variety of other sports Minnesota boys play,
especially American football and baseball. Athletic-minded boys in
Minnesota are divided among several sports, while in Madrid most
athletic boys play soccer.
Madrid boys play a lot of informal soccer outside their clubs. For
example, my boy’s public school runs from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. with a
two-hour lunch. Most boys at this school play an hour of pickup soccer
over lunch every day. Additionally, the most common game in city parks
and neighborhood play areas is soccer. Kids in Madrid play a lot of
soccer even without adults around.
EXCEPT IF YOU’RE A GIRL
Unfortunately, Madrid is not a good place for girl soccer players.
The Federación de Fútbol de Madrid has 30 different classifications of
teams by age and ability – only two of which are for girls: one league
for under-16 year-old girls and another for under-13 girls. That’s all.
By my calculations there are only 600 girls in all of greater Madrid
playing competitive soccer – which translates into 11 girls per calendar
year of birth per million inhabitants (remember the number for Madrid
boys is 770). No girls from my boys’ school play competitive soccer.
On the other hand, in Minnesota more girls play soccer than boys.
Last summer MYSA had 162 U11 girls teams with around 2000 players. That
translates to just over 600 girls per calendar year per million
inhabitants (compare: 460 Minnesota boys; 770 Madrid boys; 11 Madrid
girls). Clearly, Minnesota is a better place to be a girl soccer player.
Thank you Title IX !!
BOTTOM LINE
Madrid boys have enormous advantages in soccer over Minnesota boys.
On the other hand, Minnesota is far ahead of Madrid for girls’ soccer.
Dan Menken works for a Minneapolis holding company. He did not
grow up with soccer and is today learning the beautiful game through his
children.
10 & 11 year old match in Collado Villalba on December 3, 2011.
Brian Quarstad
My name is Brian I have always had a love of soccer since I was 19 and had the fortune to both play and coach in the beautiful game. I live in Minnesota so my main interest lies in the MLS as well as some of the local leagues, though I no longer contribute to this site.. you can still find some of previous posts here