Team formation
Division commissioners (DCs) for each age group reach out to parents in the summer to find out if your children have any days they cannot practice. The DCs will take availability information into account when forming teams. Other factors:
- Balanced teams. We aim for a mix of skills and experience on each team
- Schools. Each player will be assigned to a team with at least one and as many as three other schoolmates. Most teams will include players from three or four different schools so that players see familiar faces and have the opportunity to make new friends. Grouping players by schools also facilitates carpooling
Many parents request that their children be placed on teams with a group of school friends. Our league policy is to accommodate friend requests only when the parents have volunteered as coaches or referees.
Practices
Team coaches select the fields and days that they will hold weekday practices with the exception of kinderleague, which has no weekday practices. Practices are scheduled for 4:30 and 5:30 every weekday at park and school fields throughout Menlo Park and Atherton.
Younger teams (1st & 2nd grade) typically hold one practice per week; older teams practice twice a week. Practices last about an hour and begin in late August.
Players must wear shinguards to practices as well as games; cleats are optional but recommended. Players should also bring labeled water bottles to every practice.
Games
All games are held on Saturdays except for the high school divisions, which play on Sundays. Game times will vary from week to week, but most games are in the morning. In the younger age divisions, all games are played in our region; older teams may occasionally travel to nearby cities (Portola Valley, Redwood City) for games.
Game length is as follows:
Kinderleague: 75-minute combination practice and game
1st & 2nd: two 20-minute halves plus a halftime of approximately five minutes
U10: two 25-minute halves plus halftime
U12: two 30-minute halves
U14: two 35-minute halves
U19: two 45-minute halves