Growing up, my only goal was to play college soccer. From the teams I joined, to the videos I made, I was only trying to get noticed by the elite level teams in the country. There are a lot of myths abut the recruiting process, especially with soccer, but I am here to squash those and give you the three biggest tips to making it and going to the school of your choice to play the sport that you love.

Tip #1: Start early

A lot of people will question why you are thinking about college during your freshman year of high school, however this makes all the difference. Even though most coaches can not respond to your call or emails, letting them know where and when yo will be playing will give them the opportunity to watch you play and get you on their radar. This also means that once they can respond, starting your junior year, they will most likely have seen you play already and you will have a leg up on everyone else.

Tip #2: Write your Own Recruiting Emails

A lot of parents want their kids to play college soccer even more than their kids do. This sometimes shines through during the email writing process by the parents writing the emails for the kids. This is not how it should be. A college coach will absolutely know the difference between a student written email and a parent written email. This means that the athlete themselves need to be the ones writing it. In your email you should include a personalized message with facts that you learned while researching the given school.  This means that every email needs to be different. Do NOT write the same email for ten different school and expect to get responses as they will be able to tell this also and just forget about you all together.

Tip #3: Don’t Attend Any Camps

A lot of emails you may receive during the recruiting process will be camp invites to various schools. These invites are not formal visits and are given out to anyone who inquires about playing there. If a school really wants you they will not invite you to a camp and instead ask you to either come for an overnight visit or a day visit. These camps are nearly ways for the school to make money off of kids from around the country who think that they are being looked at when the coaches already have their recruits picked out before hand. The truth is that if you are receiving a camp invite from a school, you are probably not on their radar and need to just move on to a different school because they are not interested.

I hope that this post shed some light on some mysteries and questions that arise during the recruiting process. It is a very tricky and stressful time for a soon-to-be college soccer player, but it should also be excited trying to find the next place for your soccer career.