When the United States Men’s National team’s World Cup came to an end with a 4-1 loss to Belgium on July 6, the questions started to be asked.
Why can’t the U.S. beat the best teams in the world?
Depending on who you ask, you’ll get different answers. Some blame the pay-to-play system. Others say American athletes don’t dream of being professional soccer players.
Despite the loss to Belgium, most people view this run as a success for the United States. The team won a knockout round game for the first time since 2002, when the team beat Bosnia and Herzegovina 2-0. During the World Cup, the fan attention was palpable with the five American games drawing a total attendance of 343,661.
“I think they brought excitement and curiosity back into the game,” Niagara Pioneer Soccer Club president Ryan Suitor said. “I think that their success, even though it wasn’t what we all hoped for, still brought hope to the game. That final game left us with a bad taste in our mouth, wanting more. … I think going into the tournament, we didn’t think they would make it as far as they did. But there’s still the issue with the European clubs that we can’t get past the European clubs.”
In each of the last three World Cups that the United States has appeared in, they have gone 1-5-3 against European nations with the team’s only win being the aforementioned 2-0 win over Bosnia and Herzegovina.
One potential way to compete with the European teams is looking at youth development and the pay-to-play system of travel soccer in this country. European soccer teams have academies that identify players at an early age and invest money into their training.
While prices that players and their families are charged range with some academies like FC Barcelona reportedly covering all of the costs for their contracted players. For organizations like the Western New York Flash, a full-season costs between $500 to $4,000 depending on age and skill level range.
The Niagara Falls PAL recreational programs each cost $30 and the cost throughout the organization and the Niagara United organization goes up to $280 with additional costs varying by team. Niagara Falls PAL and Niagara United President Cathy Burke said the programs have over 1,000 participants (not 1,000 different kids) competing year-round in the two organizations spread across the age groups from 3 to 17.
But the average cost to play travel soccer in the United States is up to $15,000 per year, according to USSoccerParent.com. The average cost to play soccer in the United States is $1,188, only behind hockey, equestrian, skiing and snowboarding, per ProjectPlay.com.
In European countries, youth sports are often subsidized through the government. The cost to play grassroots soccer is often free or has minimal costs. When academies find premier players, they often play for free.
Norway, which is fresh off a trip to the World Cup quarterfinals and boasts one of the world’s best players, Erling Haaland, bans national championships before age 13. There are no regional championships until 11, nor the printing of scores in the media. Violate the rules and clubs risk government funding.
In the United States it’s illegal to fund Olympic sports, thanks to the Amateur Sports Act of 1978. In fact, youth sports is big business — a $16 billion annual business.
“I think it’s (pay-to-play) very detrimental and that’s for a couple of reasons,” Burke said. “… (Spain’s) Lamine Yamal literally grew up in a house where his bathroom and his kitchen were the same room right? If he were born in the United States … he would never have been able to afford to get him into the programs that MLS, colleges even pay any attention to.”
As the girls soccer coach at Niagara Falls High School and a boys 16-and-under coach with Niagara United, Burke has a front-row seat to seeing the soccer development of boys and girls in the community and how many kids stick with the sport from when they are little kids up to high school.
While the local youth soccer programs are very well attended, especially at the younger ages, not all of them eventually matriculate onto the high school teams, kids get lost in the shuffle or stop playing the sport altogether before they reach high school. But Burke could not pinpoint an exact reason as to why that is the case.
“I don’t know. I think there’s a lot of reasons,” she said. “Maybe they go to other sports. … If they started playing soccer younger, they just don’t want to continue. They just don’t want to play it anymore. Maybe there’s another sport or other activities. But I think that’s kind of an everywhere general.”
According to the United States Census Bureau, the median income in Niagara Falls is $49,101 per year. Which is lower than some of the teams the Falls are playing on the pitch, where the median income in Lewiston is $78,400, the median income in Grand Island is $115,991 and in East Aurora it is $103,949.
Burke can also see the impacts of having a player to look up to can have on the community and kids aspiring to have success in sports.
In the Western New York area, there are programs that are pay-to-play, but also have options to help out low-income families. One such organization is the Western New York Flash. While some of the costs of travel soccer are prohibitive to low-income families, Flash executive director of coaching Eric Dade and the organization are trying to help bring those that cannot afford to play with the organization into the fold anyway.
The organization is hoping that providing scholarships and working with inner-city programs and other similar organizations can help bring more kids into the fold that might not be able to afford it otherwise.
Since 2020, Major League Soccer has been trying to develop an academy system similar to what teams have in other countries in an effort to close the gap on a global stage. Over the last six years, the league has been running a youth soccer organization called MLSNext which has 753 teams from 151 clubs for kids from 13 to 19.
“I think the idea of pulling kids and playing in an elite level academy like the Flash and isolated for those who are elite like that I think it becomes too late and too washed down,” Suitor said. “Where if you were to have more academies that you can develop kids who just could be on the cusp of being elite or develop them to become elite because their skill sets aren’t there yet with either physical development or mental development, you might see a little bit more continuity and competition.”
Over the last four World Cups, the United States rosters have included 22 players who were born or raised outside of the United States including seven players on the 2026 World Cup roster. Many others on those rosters are first generation Americans who chose to represent the United States over some of the other options they have.
The teams have been a melting pot of players from all over the world who have put on the United States jersey and competed at the World Cup.
We are already starting to see it happen in Buffalo. Before 2009, a Buffalo Public School team had never won a Section VI boys soccer championship. With a growing Middle Eastern and African population, they have won 10.
Lackawanna, where between 20-30% of its 20,000 residents are Arab, has four sectional championships during that span.
“You get a lot of immigrants that come, different people that come from different countries that are living in the U.S., these are people that, European families or African families,” Dade said. “… They grew up, generations of their families playing it and those generations pass that on to their kids. So I do think it’s extremely important that we do pay particular attention to the immigrants in our country and continue to provide opportunity for them.”