LA Premier FC and LA Surf Merge To Create a Mega Club in Key Market
Elite, high-performance pathways for talented youth soccer players have become more rigorous and demanding as our country strives to showcase its soccer skills on the world stage. While our USA Women break records in the opening game of the 2019 Women’s World Cup, defeating Thailand 13-0, youth clubs all across America are focused on developing the next generation of professionals players.
What does it really take to successfully develop and help today’s youth players to reach their potential and bringing the joy back to youth soccer? Vision, experience and resources.
In the ever-changing American youth soccer landscape, what remains a constant is that the better players and coaches are attracted to a well-known brand, a name they can trust and feel represents quality.
This is understandable, especially with the myriad of often confusing choices in youth soccer. A youth club that affords opportunities to play in the U.S. Soccer Development Academy, Boys ECNL and Girls DPL, among other leagues, can easily set itself apart, but when you add a proven track record for developing professional players with an outstanding reputation for producing professional, world-class tournaments — a club has the distinct advantage to dominate the market. This is the Surf brand.
If you want to build the best youth soccer club, it helps to have the Surf resources behind you — and Barry Ritson‘s goal is to build the leading youth soccer club in the country. Ritson announced yesterday that LA Premier FC will join with LA Surf SC; adding to the recently established merger of SoCal Academy, San Gabriel Valley Surf and Soltilo FC.
“The expansion of LA Surf brings together the best of the best in players, coaches and administrators,” said Jeremy McDonald, Vice-President of Surf Cup Sports. “We could not be more excited to welcome LA Premier FC to the Surf Family.”
The truth: In the modern, ultra-competitive environment, a youth soccer club either is growing or shrinking.
LA Premier FC will begin rebranding their whole
“In a changing landscape, like youth soccer, being able to adapt, integrate and evolve is necessary to deliver the optimal environment for all of our members,” said Ritson who is now the new CEO of LA Surf and is currently in Amsterdam as Head Coach for U15 Girls USYNT. “Creating this new structure and pooling vast resources together of all of the stakeholders gives us the platform to be more efficient in our work, provide the very best development environment for players in our area — at all levels of the game — and gives us a more prominent and exciting role on the national level.”
The clear vision is to build the #1 club in the country
Barry Ritson, CEO – LA Surf
“The coming together of the 3 clubs, SoCal Academy, San Gabriel Valley Surf and Soltilo FC, showed a great vision for the LA market,” said Ritson. “With this existing base, it was just a quick 5-week process. From the very first day, there was a desire to put egos aside and look at what the market needs. Everyone was fantastic to work with. The LA market is unrivalled and is massive.”
Our collective goal has always been to make LA Surf the best club and this is another step towards achieving this goal,” said Matt Bradbury, founder of San Gabriel Valley Surf. “We are relentless in our pursuit to offer the best experiences and opportunities to our players.”
The day you stop progressing as a club, you are not meeting the needs of your players.
Matt Bradbury
“Bringing LA Premier FC teams into the Surf brand is a continuation of a goal we set at the very inception of LA Surf, to make this organization the best in Los Angeles County and give our players every possible opportunity to achieve their goals,” said Brian Waltrip, COO – LA Surf. “With the addition of LA Premier FC, LA Surf now has more than 120 teams and 60 coaches.”
The Surf brand has always dominated Southern California with the prestigious San Diego Surf SC as the original Surf youth soccer club. Now, with the 126 youth soccer teams in Orange County wearing the Surf logo, the combined total is an estimated 300 teams that will hit the fields from LA to San Diego after the LA Surf branding. In fact, add in all the 18 Surf National Affiliates spanning the USA from New York to LA and there are more than 16,000 youth players wearing the Surf logo.
Nationally recognized for decades, Surf first kicked off 42 years ago and is one of the founding organizations in American youth soccer. With over $7 Million in charitable donations, Surf is an organizations that believes in giving back as well as paving the road forward.
Ritson is a leading voice in youth soccer and was responsible for the growth and success of LA Premier for 16 years. When asked ‘Why
“We believe we can be stronger together and unifying Greater Los Angeles will maximize resources, expand player pools and give more opportunities for players.”
Barry Ritson
Effective immediately, all LA Premier teams will become LA Surf.
Working with LA Premier’s Rod Lafaurie, Nick Gumpert and Kim Mediano along with the existing leadership at LA Surf, the integration should flow smoothly for the upcoming 2019/2020 season, especially as there will be no coaching changes for any of the already formed teams.
“Surf Soccer is mission-driven to provide premier experiences and opportunities for players across the USA,” said Chris Adams, Business Development Director, Surf Cup Sports. “With the addition of LA Premier to our already incredibly strong SoCal foundation, our entire national Surf network — from Hawaii to Washington and Texas and beyond — is raised and reflects the high quality of Surf Nation.”
“LA Surf is an elite club and we welcome LA Premier and their coaches, players and families,” said Chris Araya, Director of LA Surf Pomona. “We want to always be the best and this is a great step towards our relentless pursuit of this goal.”
Read: U.S. UNDER-16
