This Is American Soccer, US Soccer, MNT, WNT, and MLS - Tackling the subject of Soccer in the US, and worldwide.

I’m back in the swamp of Florida for the next few days, attending the Nike Friendlies (full disclosure: Nike sponsors this website) and doing something I’ve wanted to do for a long time: get deep inside the USSF residency program (did you know their school is in a strip-mall), all of which is at IMG Academy in Bradenton, where us normal folk pay upwards of $70,000 for a year of on-sight instruction from the nation’s best coaches in any number of sports (Nick Bollettieri first brought attention to this mess of filled-in wetlands with his tennis academy).

It’s never too late to live a childhood dream, and this is as close as I’ll get (alas, there is no U-30 team). My arrival has already been filled with education and enlightenment, but I’m going to need some time to let it sink in. Check back for daily updates from the field, the U-17 MNT’s game against Brazil, and from Clint Dempsey, as well as longer stories on the youth developmental program. There’s a little bit for everyone here. Those of you wondering how to get in the program, I’ll have some advice from the man in charge, John Hackworth. Those looking to see who our rising MNT stars will be, I’ll bring you some names and hopefully let some of those names speak for themselves. For some of us, the future is 2010, but for these 14, 15, 16, and 17-year-olds, the future is now, with dreams of pro soccer and maybe, maybe, a trip to South Africa.