For the last four days, FC Dallas coaches and officials have seen some 2,000 players take to the fields surrounding Pizza Hut Park at Sueno MLS 2008. Now comes the hard part, paring down the field of hopefuls to 60 venue finalists, which will be announced tomorrow.
"The first three days, it's been an experience," said Chris Clarke, FC Dallas director of youth development. "I would say that about 90 percent of the players have been local and between 17 and 25. We have a number of out-of-state people that came in as well but they're in their mid-20s and are more established players. It's been predominantly Hispanic players that have come out, South American and Mexican players, but we've seen very few American kids."
Since this is the first year for Sueno in Dallas, Clarke admits that he and the other FCD coaches didn't quite know what to expect before the event kicked off on Friday.
"Honestly, we weren't sure what was going to happen in terms of talent level," Clarke said. "We talked briefly with the Chivas USA people and they said that they got a very mixed bag in terms of their talent. We just didn't know what to expect because it was quite a wide net and cast for 2,000 people.
"The talent level has gone from people that are going to say that they've tried out for a professional team, which is great for them, to people who are established players," Clarke continued. "You also have the middle-of-the-pack guys who play locally, whether it's club or high school soccer. We went in with no expectations in terms of talent level but we did know what we were looking for."
FCD head coach Steve Morrow has definitely liked what he has seen.
"There are some good players out there," Morrow said. "It's a great event and has been very successful so far. The coaches have been watching everything very closely. It's their task to identify players for the next part."
About a year ago, the Hoops had a combine where they invited in a number of players. Two of those spent time with the team during preseason but Morrow said Sueno is a bit different.
"Last year was our own combine with players that we invited in, so it's different," Morrow said. "But the quality has been every bit as good. The range is quality is obviously greater when you have so many kids but for the most part, there have been quality players in every game."
Even though Clarke has liked what he has seen thus far, he knows the task of cutting the field to 60 is somewhat daunting.
"It's huge," he admitted. "The initial decision is tough because these kids are coming in and playing a 36-minute, 11-on-11 scrimmage. They're playing alongside people that they don't normally play with and against people they don't normally play against. There are players out there who have played, haven't played, are doing this for fun or think it might be a cool thing to do. It's a pressure environment for the kids because they only have 36 minutes to impress."
However, the ultimate barometer is how close they are to making FCD's developmental roster.
"We tell them all at the start to just play soccer and the game you know how to play," Clarke said. "If they do that, then the quality will show and we'll be able to pick from that. I work a lot with (FCD assistant coach) Marco (Ferruzzi) on the developmental squad, so I know the level of player there and have put that comparison to the players here.
"I want to see if there are any players that are close enough to that level that we could either bring in straight away or who are close enough that we could train them to get there. In all honesty, I haven't seen anyone that could threaten the 28-man roster but there are a couple of candidates that if they couldn't take a developmental roster spot, they could definitely come close to taking one."
At the end of each day, Clarke has met with the other coaches and assessors to determine which players were the best candidates to be among the final 60 along with others to be included as alternates on a "just in case" list as Clarke calls it. That process will be repeated following Monday's final session as the final list must be submitted Tuesday morning. But he admits that coming up with four teams of 15 players each presents its own unique set of challenges.
"The difficulty on our side is that we have to make four teams from 60," Clarke said. "It's not necessarily about picking the best players because we have to keep four goalkeepers, four right backs, four left backs and so on. That's been a challenge as well but I understand the concept of doing that because you want to have higher-level organized games to see the talent. If you brought in a small number, you can't really put them in a realistic environment. Bringing them into a game is the best way to evaluate a player."
Clarke also admits that other variables can, and often do, come into play.
"It might come down to something as simple as being born a month earlier than someone else or if someone is local," he said. "We want to make sure anyone from out of town is head and shoulders above the local people if we're going to ask them to come back in. If there's a local kid who is the same or on that level, we will probably pick the local kid just to be fair to their travel, time and expense to come to this program."
Steve Hunt is a contributor to MLSnet.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
