Plano Sports Authority Texas Thunder Academy Teams - Info?

Anyone know anything about the Plano Sports Authority Texas Thunder Academy Boy's Teams or Program? Seriously consider or not?

We played there a few seasons back, competition is average to good. They're not sanctioned by US Youth Soccer and they dont play by age group, they group on grade. You can have 15 year old 5th graders.

rdeal486 wrote:We played there a few seasons back, competition is average to good.  They're not sanctioned by US Youth Soccer and they dont play by age group, they group on grade.  You can have 15 year old 5th graders.

You are mixing up the PSA with the Thunder soccer club.

The Thunder is actually a club with teams organized by Mike Kramer at PSA. The club teams play in the Plano Premier League (competitive) - which is US Soccer/NTSSA recognized. I believe they have several teams, several age groups, and several coaches.

At a young age, (prior to U11), the Thunder teams may play in any of the local leagues - iincluding the PSA leagues - which are grade based. Or they may play in any of the other multitude of local leagues, depending on the competitiveness of the team. (The PSA leagues are grade based (not age), but there is an actual age cutoff - so no 15 year olds could play on a 5th grade team. But you could see someone a year older, who was held back a grade). I've seen plenty of this in basketball there - so even though you are right, it is grade based, you exaggerate the age they could be - there is a cutoff.

The Thunder Club is an interesting idea. At young ages (U6 - U10) - you can find really good players at the PSA - and theoretically, if you were able to cherry pick those players, you could create some formidable teams. Not sure it will ever actually work that way or not, but it is possible. I remember several 00 teams that formed through the PSA - that went on to be top end teams in the competitive leagues. But this was all pre-Thunder.

As far as whether you should seriously consider it, its like any other team for your child - if you find a good coach, with players your child gets along with, and your child wants to keep playing and is advancing - then yea, you should seriously consider it. If you try out with a coach there who makes your child not want to play - run away quickly - regardless of the club.

Like you said R1, I agree, the PSA Thunder Academy teams are an interesting idea. They have a huge pool of Rec teams that play at the PSA to try and recruit players from, and the local Plano area desperately needs an Academy type organization.  Just to clarify, the Texas Thunder do go by the US Soccer birth date requirements (Aug 1 to Jul 31, etc.) of players rather than the PSA Rec team's requirement of school grade only. I think only time will tell if the PSA Thunder organization is successful, but for now, from what I have seen, the basics just aren't there yet even though they do have a few really outstanding players. Then again, I don't have much to compare the Thunder with so far. Maybe someone out there has more insight into the program.

I overlooked the Thunder Academy and yes, they do follow a true birth year grouping. My concern is the limited amount of teams and exposure coming from the PSA Thunder. They do have a large pool of rec kids which they should be able to draw from, but, I just don't see that happening right now.