There are few things more difficult than trying to predict the future. Just ask a meteorologist. Even armed with tons of equipment and a degree, predicting the weather correctly is a tough task. Predicting the future of youth soccer isn’t much easier, but I’m going to give it a shot.
What will youth soccer be like when my kids have children of their own? I’ve got a cynical streak, but in this case, I’ll be optimistic. My kids are teenagers now, so I’m going to look ahead to about 2035. It’s a little scary to think about having grandkids — I still can’t believe I have two teens — but let’s go there.
So we’re looking ahead 17 years, which may not seem like that far into the future. But think about what the world was like 17 years ago, in 2001. Strictly from a technology standpoint, things were shockingly different. Social media as we now know it didn’t exist: Facebook, Twitter and even Myspace were years away from launching. Apple launched the iTunes store and the first iPod and popularized the sale of music downloads, but the first iPhone didn’t come out for another six years.
