What started as a small “pick-up play” program in southeast houston has truly made a impact in the community. Houston Futsal Club is leading the entire city with an organized futsal developmental program that is turning recreational kids into confident, individual and creative players. Houston Futsal Club is a ground up independent club with no affiliation or partnership with any major outdoor soccer clubs in the area.

This weekend at the United States Youth Futsal Association, which is the biggest youth futsal organization in the entire united states,  a group of local 2010 boys who all started off playing “futsal friday-pick up play” have taken the name Houston Futsal Club to another level. They not only participated but dominated  their age group in a four-pool, 20 teams National Tournament. Taking on futsal clubs from St Louis, Kansas City, Tennessee, Florida and falling short in the finals with a 4-1 deficit vs FC Flair from Massachusetts. To think that a ground up group of southeast Houston kids could pull off such a successful tournament is unimaginable and sets the bar extremely high for our younger club members.

Time and time again the sport of Futsal is suppressed in our Houston area and many clubs and coaches look the other way. For many coaches/clubs who do support futsal, they only see the sport as a “supplement” to soccer development. When in reality, Futsal should be the CORE of soccer development.

The amount of touches, transitions, skills, and creativity that Futsal provides is the cognitive trigger to a child’s brain at a young age. Club leaders lose sight of the “a developmental pathway” to youth soccer by covering up youth soccer programs with brand names and amazing acronyms. Club leaders in our area are focused on branding out their club names when in reality should be investing in their neighborhood community rec centers or local churches for a futsal friday night!

Everyday we lose intelligent and creative youth soccer players to oversized fields and high coaching expectations forcing the young child to be passive and robotic at a very young age.

As club leaders and parents of our youth soccer community, we need to begin to see the game in a child perspective, and place them in proper environments to develop.

Don’t be mislead by this message, HFA has NOT fully discovered the “pathway to development” but we know that there is no pathway without futsal in a child’s early age development.

The current developmental pathway is leading us directly into rushed 7v7, 9v9, and 11v11 environments by the time the child is U13. We are quick to forget that there is nothing else after 11v11. It is estimated that your child will play that formation on average 12 years after U13..why rush?

PLAY MORE FUTSAL

–Jay Lozoya President/Founder