In Suffolk County I would say it is worth keeping an eye on Smithtown, Lindenhurst, Commack, Bay Shore and HBC. All strong teams with good solid players. Should be fun to watch.

How will they determine divisions since most of the teams were interleage last year and not LIJSL? Is it a crap shoot and the Spring it will change???

If it is a crap shoot then the teams will be lucky. Read the "buzz" on the marquee above. The league will not look kindly on u9 teams that played inter- league last Fall and Spring is my strong opinion...and something for u9 and up teams to strongly consider this Fall.

that sucks because our club doesnt allow U9 Travel, they stopped it. so what would end up happeneing? we would be in a lower division as a "punishment"? thats insane.

BOTN has repeated this warning for over a year. When the person who runsnthe inter-league makes business threats to the LIJ president there will be repercussions.

Be smart and stay with the leader andnalways re ever that the LIJ does not have a sense humor, and does not take any crap from wannabe entrepreneurs, and will be unkind to this that cross them.

Youth soccer is a business and the smart money is still on LIJ.

SSI has always been an alternative for those who do not want to play travel soccer. It never was a threat to LIJSL's business.

LIJSL made SSI's life miserable over insurance issues which is why Lou affiliated with US Club Soccer. True, SSI did not threaten the LIJSL president, and did not go out to hurt the league.

Some people think they are smarter than they really are and think of themselves as so self-important that the hurt they put on others, including the players is not given a second thought.

As coach or a parent you need to realize that U9 is available in the LIJ and the only way to go beyond LIJ in a few years is to be in LIJ and with good standing.

So, a quick question regarding this--inter-town moving to travel. If you belong to a club that had tryouts and created two U9 travel teams for the upcoming year.

There were several kids cut from the team and the head trainer "promises that there will be a "C" team for next year. How would this U9 team be viewed for next year in U10? (Oh, and some of the cuts were because of coach choices and some of the players could easily be interchanged with about half of the players that made the "B" team).

If my kids didn’t make either of the two U9 teams irrespective of whether they didn’t get in due to skills or politics I would not wait a year to see if the club has enough kids to make a “C” team. Even if the coach is sincere there might only be 5-7 kids available where a team needs 12 to be viable. Find another club for your kids to train and play for as waiting around for a year will not help your kids.

That's exactly what I was thinking. Especially since the U9 age group has been left in what I would like to call a "soccer quasi" land. Very little extra training offered--it seems that if they didn't make the "A" or the "B" team, they fall into this hole and you have to figure it out yourself.

Now to find a more suitable place for my child.

Thanks for replying!