I need to preface this section with the following statement. 

Though I make some comments about the Woodbury Soccer Club, I currently harbor no ill will towards 99.9% of the people involved with the program.  I believe the community association has continued to work to offer solid developmental opportunities to thousands of players in the city of Woodbury (as well as in surrounding areas) and there are many good people currently devoting numerous volunteer hours to this cause.  I view the club as a model community club here in our state.

In the spring of 2004, I (along with the help of people like Jim Niemann - see SoWashCo Alliance) spear-headed a movement within the Woodbury Soccer Club to begin a year-round development Academy within the club for the 04/05 Minnesota soccer year (Aug 04 through Jul 05).  My team, the Woodbury Soccer Academy (WSA) Magic as they were known by at that time, was one of eight U9 to U12 teams comprised of players and families who were interested in this year-round commitment to the sport.  Though the majority of these Academy players resided in the city of Woodbury, a number of players from surrounding communities were attracted to the club because of the development plan.  Our U12 WSA Renegades team was actually formed with the inclusion of a number of the SoWashCo Alliance players from St Croix, Mahtomedi, and Cottage Grove.  This ended up being one of the pitfalls of the Academy program under the Woodbury Soccer Club, and the year-round Academy program was disbanded after only three months.  But more on this later.

The fall training in 2004 was terrific.  We had all eight WSA teams training together at the same site, mainly because we were bringing in some high quality trainers from outside the area and I needed to schedule their assigned teams back to back to maximize the trainers' time out in our area.  Thanks in large part to my sometimes-mild-sometimes-not OCD, I had all the players in the same training outfits (shirts, shorts, and socks) and a real sense of "Academy culture" was blooming.  These training kits and the "elitist" air they helped to create was cited as one of the reasons the Woodbury Soccer Club board wanted to do away with the Academy program.

We sent five teams to the Pepsi Cup fall tournament in Milwaukee in October (another reason given for disbanding the Academy) and the top teams at the U11 and U12 girls age groups emerged as fall State Champs and the MYSA Harvest Fest to close out the fall season.

There were definitely some inherent problems with the Academy concept it's first season.  Some parents claimed they felt forced into this year-round training program if they wanted to play on an "A" team with the club.  I understood this issue and was prepared to get creative to offer up alternatives.  Another problem was that I spent a number of months focused on this program when I was in a position to really be focused on the entire club.  Regardless, in my mind things could have been worked out with some up front communication and discussion. 

During that fall the Woodbury board began fielding complaints about "elitism" and preferential treatment for Academy teams (training kits, coordinated tournament ventures, advanced scheduling of training times, using all the top coaches in the fall, etc).  Some of the board members, most of whom were instrumental in hiring me four years back, were now the biggest proponents against my work.  Led by the President at that time, a secret board meeting was called to try and vote me out of the club in mid-September. 

I don't know the exact details of this meeting, but according to three or four Abboud-friendly board members who spoke to me about it a few weeks later, the vote was close - 5 to 4 against ousting me... much to the disappointment of a few certain people I'm sure.  I still hold firm to the feeling that a lot of this "trouble" could have been worked out with more open communication.  I said this to the board's face on more than one occasion back when everything was going on.  Woodbury decision makers claimed to have been trying to talk to me over the last few months - maybe I was blinded by a vision.

After the secret-board-meeting-to-try-and-can-our-maniacal-coaching-director failure, I made the fortunate mistake of missing the following board meeting due to my participation in a Texas Hold 'em Poker Tournament at the local track/casino, Canterbury Park.  I say "fortunate here as this was the real turning point that led to my separation with the club and the ability to continue the Academy concept under Bangu Tsunami FC).  I returned home that night to find an email waiting for me from the club President, in essence saying thanks for my work, but the Academy program was going to be disbanded at the conclusion of the fall season.  To this day I still feel my blood boiling when I think about this email.  This Academy program was advertised as a year-long pilot program.  Many non-Woodbury players chose to leave their local community clubs and join the Woodbury club to take part in this program, and to pull the rug out from underneath them was extremely short-sighted and inconsiderate. 

I would have also liked to believe that the board knew how hard I had worked over the last eight months to implement this program and how much it meant to me.  Thinking back on it now, certain board members probably thought that if they couldn't vote me out, there was a good chance all hell would break loose if this program was disbanded and I would likely leave on my own.  They were right.

To make a long story longer, I tried to fight to keep the Woodbury Soccer Academy going.  I set up a meeting with Gene Johnson, the President of the Woodbury Athletic Association (WAA), in an attempt to see if we the Academy could spin off of the Woodbury Soccer Club and run as a separate entity still under the umbrella of WAA.  My main reason for approaching WAA was to have the ability to secure indoor time and out door fields as part of the local athletic association while not being under the governance of a community club board made up of a majority of parents who had no kids involved in the Academy itself.  Gene didn't think this was a good idea and was reluctant to stir the pot in the athletic association.  I can respect that. 

I then called for an emergency board meeting to try and sort things out with them face to face.  I knew I was in real trouble when many of my friends on the board politely declined to acknowledge me when I walked in, like I was some homeless relative that had decided to crash a family reunion.  It was very eye opening for me to see the negative feelings many board members had towards the Academy program and towards me, with one woman, a nice, sweet, petite little thing who up until that point had barely uttered a peep in the 8 months she was on the board, shot me a glare from across the board table full of malice and contempt, and accused me of ruining the Woodbury Soccer Club.  Wow.

The debate raged on for a few hours, basically me against everyone else.  I still had supporters in the room, but I think most of them were too timid and scared to step up to bat for me against some of the more vocal members.  I tried to plead my case about the flexibility of the program and gave concrete solutions to every single issue that was brought up against the Academy, but too many minds in the room had already been made up.  

It was decided to hold a forum for all the Academy parents the following week to discuss the disbanding and options for moving forward.  I tried to forewarn the board of the repercussions of cancelling this program at this time, but they assured me they were fully prepared to deal with whatever Academy parent issues would be fired their way.  As I mentioned above, this had been billed as a year-long pilot program and many non-Woodbury residents had forgone their own club tryouts to take part in this program.  It was not fair to them to disband this program, potentially leaving them out in the cold without a team to play on.

Moreover, I had seen the passion and interest this program generated in a few short months and knew that many families would not take this board decision lightly. 

This all fell on deaf ears.  The board, shut up in their little board room, had made a decision without the majority of them never even having seen what this program was all about.  Again, as with the SoWashCo Alliance, a board did not have a finger on the pulse of players and families involved. 

The forum went poorly.  A lot of people showed up.  Probably a good 90% of the Academy families and another 20 or 30 non-Academy Woodbury parents who had issues with the program.  A very mediocre PowerPoint presentation by the board was cut short when met with heckles and jeers as impatient parents demanded justification for the abrupt termination of the Academy instead of smoke and mirrors.

The board somehow thought they had my support in moving forward with the disbandment, and when I simply sat there without contributing to either side of the argument, I was deemed a traitor and backstabber with no sense of "team" or loyalty to the board.  The hypocrisy was amazing.  Was I the one who called a secret board meeting to can my ass? 

I left the forum with a number of coaches and parents and headed to a local bar.  Over a few ales, the decision was made to look at other options for continuing the Academy program outside of the Woodbury Soccer Club.  I called a good friend of mine, Bob Hoaglin, with the Bangu Tsunami Futbol Club, a more select-type club that stepped to their own beat.  We discussed the possibility of forming a new club under the Bangu umbrella on the east side of town and he welcomed the idea. 

I emailed in my resignation to the board the next day and set up another forum for the current Academy families to discuss the Bangu option.  In the end, six out of the eight teams made the decision to leave the Woodbury Soccer Club and start a new soccer club in the area.  Thus, the Bangu Tsunami Soccer Academy was born.

Though it took me a long time to stop feeling resentful towards some of the Woodbury Soccer Club decision makers, I now better understand where they were coming from.  They had a duty to look out for the best interest of ALL their players, and the majority of their membership would not be affected by any decision made regarding the Academy.  And, as this was the case, why continue a program that was dividing the club?

I also now realize that this Academy program would have always been handcuffed and stifled under the community club's banner.  Soccer development and programming decisions would have always had to pass through a parent-driven board of fourteen decisions makers, many of whom (bless their souls for their volunteer time and their efforts) were many times naive about true player development of the higher level players.  Under BTFC, and the one true strength of their club, soccer decisions are put in the hands of soccer professionals.  I, along with other experienced soccer coaches and directors, have been given the freedom and support to run with the Academy concept at the young age levels, and today we have sixteen teams in two different Academy programs (East and South).

Overall, I really enjoyed my four years with the Woodbury club and am thankful to have had the opportunity to witness firsthand the inner workings of a community-based soccer club.  I no longer harbor any ill-will towards most of the board members involved in the 2004 chaos, and have actually traded a number of cordial emails with the old club President, both of us realizing that things were not handled in the best manner.  It was a learning and growing experience for everyone involved, and I am thankful that my experience has set me on the youth development path that I walk today.