A guide for youth soccer players on getting MLS NEXT or ECNL tryouts. Email coaches a polite message with a 30-second highlight video, target non-affiliated teams first, and send to multiple staff members. Start around age 10-13 to position yourself for selection by 8th-10th grade.
What should you email an MLS NEXT or ECNL team in order to get a tryout? So this depends if you're emailing an MLS team that's directly affiliated with a professional team or if it's just MLS NEXT. If it's MLS NEXT and not affiliated with the Galaxy and whatnot, start with them first because they're much more likely to respond. And with them, what you would say, a version of, is, "Dear coach, I'm currently playing for so-and-so. I've attached a highlight video here. I'd like to inquire about coming for tryouts." Most coaches would love to have a player for tryouts. Most coaches would be very surprised if you already have highlights. And if they watch your video and they go, hey, you are really good on your team, you're better than most of your kids on your team, we can see it through the video, we'd love to have you on trial. And this is awesome because now you get to actually go train with the team and see if you're good enough. And guess what? If you don't make it, you can say— the coach can tell you, look, we don't think you're the level, but we're going to keep an eye on you. Remember, at this point you're only 11, 12, 13. That's okay. You're going to try out each time. What matters is by the time you hit, you know, 8th, 9th, 10th grade, you want to be playing MLS Next or ECNL. So you have to be trying out for them at the ages of 11, 12, 13, maybe even 10. And the premise here is what's gonna make you different when you email is you're gonna have a video. So you need a highlight video. It doesn't have to be long, could be 30 seconds to a minute, but it needs to be a highlight video that you can send to these coaches and you have to write a lovely email. The other thing is you cannot only email one person. You don't just go look up the director of coaching and hope he responds. You gotta email the director of coaching. You gotta email the U18 coach, the U15 coach, U14. You gotta email almost everybody on their list. Because that's the only way you're gonna get a response out of them because they get so many emails. If you want more help, give me a call. I'm the MLS— howtoplaymlsnextguy/ecnl, and I'll talk to you soon. DM me.
