Photo Philadelphia Union Communications

Philadelphia Union’s Director of Academy and Professional Development Jon Scheer (see photo) should be pleased with the results of MLS NEXT Cup. All three teams intended for entry qualified as one of each age group’s 32 participants, the U15s, U16s, and U18s. And the U15s won their age group’s competition, bringing home championship silverware for the display case located in the chairman’s lounge directly adjacent to the Primepoint Club that lies directly under Subaru Park’s video display board.

The tournaments

For the first time, female teams participated in MLS NEXT Cup. Our focus remained on the boys, since YSC Academy and the Union Academy’s soccer teams remain boys only.

For 2025 the event for males called MLS NEXT Cup consisted of two different competitions staged among six different age groups. The event planned to guarantee every participating team the opportunity for five games. The five were to be achieved by populating a “Showcase” from the teams that had lost in previous rounds of the single elimination playoffs. We have not discovered how showcase matchups were determined. Nor do we know how the tournament handled weather delays.

The total event maximizes participants’ exposure to scouts, both amateur and professional.

While we are confident plenty of NCAA and Junior College programs scouted the event vigorously, we assume there was an even higher representation from professional youth development academies. We suspect that Director Scheer himself, his entire staff, and probably additional personnel had identified  players of interest in advance and watched them as much and as closely as possible.

MLS NEXT Cup’s male competitions and male age groups

As soccer vernacular calls it, the Union U18s were “playing up” against other U19 sides.

The Academy U18s included some individuals who themselves were“playing up”. For example, recently signed Union II professional Malik Jakupovic (a striker who will turn 16 on Tuesday, June 24^th , tomorrow) provided two assists Monday, June 16^th the day the U18s beat Colorado Rapids 3-0 in their playoffs round-of-16 match.

We make no attempt to provide rosters for the three Union Academy sides. In 2016 Bethlehem Steel FC head coach Brendan Burke asked us to preserve the adolescence of the academy youngsters as long as possible. Protecting them and their families from invasive badgering by scouts would be another way of phrasing coach Burke’s point in current circumstances.

Below we provide each Academy team’s playoffs results. At this writing no Academy showcase results have been posted, and only one Academy showcase match has been scheduled.  We cannot confirm officially or unofficially that thunderstorms and lightning strikes disrupted scheduling for the showcase portion of the event.