The Equalizer: What we can learn from Belgium

In September of 2006, Michel Sablon, Belgian soccer’s newly appointed technical director, was putting the finishing touches on his blueprint for Belgium soccer’s revolution. Only eight years later, at the 2014 World Cup, Belgium was positioned as the fifth-best team going into the tournament, according to FIFA. Not only that, but Belgium had produced a golden generation of players: Eden Hazard, Romelu Lukaku and Thibaut Courtois are only some of the world class players produced by Belgium in the late 2000s. So how did a relatively unsuccessful small country of 11.35 million achieve such success? And if Belgium can do it in such a short time, why can’t the United States?

Belgium’s emergence as a global superpower is no miracle. It is the outcome of a structured system where resources and money were put into a comprehensive plan. Sablon’s first step was to invest a chunk of Belgium’s Euro 2000’s profits into youth development. After the Belgian Soccer Federation made entry-level coaching courses free, participation rapidly increased. By comparison, in the United States, a top youth coaching license is around $4,000.

Sablon’s team also asked the University of Louvain in Brussels to carry out an extensive study of youth soccer in Belgium, involving the filming 1,500 matches across different age groups. The study supported Sablon’s theory that there is too much focus on winning and not enough on development; it also suggested focusing on two vs. two, five vs. five, and eight vs. eight small-sided games to optimize touches and the learning of diagonal passing.

Anderlecht, the top club team in Belgium, also instituted the “Purple Talents” project, which seeks to improve the technical ability of their players through three local one-hour sessions per week. Simply put, more hours practicing translates to higher levels of play.

A common complaint from American families is that pursuing soccer professionally means not getting a good education. But in Belgium, academies are instructed to suspend players from training if their grades drop off. Communication between schools and academies is difficult, but not impossible if it’s made a priority.

Belgian youth academies were also vastly improved with the implementation of Double PASS, a soccer academy auditing service. Double PASS uses an accreditation system to “grade” soccer academies on eight factors. The combined score corresponds with different levels of play and funding from the country’s soccer federation. The higher the grade, the higher level of funding and competition for the youth club.

This neutral auditing system supports and cultivates competition between academies, driving investment. In 2015, Double PASS announced a partnership with U.S. Soccer. Does that mean we’ll have our own Thomas Mueller in ten years? Probably not. More realistically, coaching, training regimens and club philosophy at youth academies will improve before we see progress in the players themselves.  

Belgium’s transition from a mediocre national team to a global superpower was made possible by a total, top-down belief in and adherence to the Federation’s plan. The success of a similar plan implemented in the United States is just as dependent on every member involved trusting the process as it is on the quality of the plan itself.