Over Presidents’ Day Weekend in mid February, 350 Rush Soccer players and over 40 coaches came together to represent the Rush Select Program at the Presidents’ Day Tournament (PDT) in Phoenix, Arizona. Twenty-two teams (eleven male and eleven female) in the 2001-2006 birth years took to the fields, walking away on Presidents’ Day with 10 Championship finishes and 1 Finalist finish.

Among the coaches in attendance was Rush Soccer’s Director of Coach & Player Development, Davide Corti. Corti, a former professional player who competed at some of the highest levels of professional soccer in Italy with teams like A.C. Milan, F.C. Empoli, and A.C. Novar, began working with Rush Soccer in 2018. His role at the club is to help develop coaches and players domestically and internationally as Rush continues in its mission to be one of the most recognizable soccer brands in the world.

Following his 13 year professional career, Corti began working as a Youth Talent Scout and Supervisor of the Soccer School of Coach Development with A.C. Milan. His experience scouting and reporting on key players within the Academy system there lends itself very advantageous for the wealth of knowledge and expertise he now brings to the Rush organization.

While attending PDT in Phoenix, Corti spent many hours on the fields interacting with Rush Select coaches and players, observing games, and taking note of the key components that led some teams to a successful weekend. One of the major questions he walked away asking coaches was, “For the future of our players, should we focus on the INDIVIDUAL or COLLECTIVE development? Should we improve players more individually or improve patterns for the team to play the game?”

One of Corti’s desires in his role as Director of Coach & Player Development is to engage coaches and players alike by jump starting thought and conversation. By asking questions and sharing different ideas, he hopes these audiences will want to think more thoughtfully about how to take the right steps forward as a club. As the Rush Way Philosophy of coaching and developing players sets out to compete on the fields in the years ahead, he is eager to see all the coaches recognize the importance of asking these questions and problem solving based on the changes and growth happening in the sport itself.

Corti is continuing to develop relationships among the coaching staff across Rush Nation as he attends various programs and events, as well as visit clubs domestically and internationally. He spoke highly of his experience at PDT with Rush Select as he concluded:

“It was really nice attending the PDT tournament for the first time. It was outstanding for me. It’s amazing how this feeling of belonging to this big Rush family is within every coach, player and family, and it makes me proud to be a part of it.

I was impressed as well from the quality I saw in each team and the improvements each one of the players made over the weekend. In comparison to how soccer was in the U.S. years ago, the improvements are much easier to see now. It was also incredible to see how players coming from different clubs and states were able to gather together and play a really high-quality level of soccer.”

Following his experience at PDT, Corti jumped on another plane to Puerto Rico to help with the development of one of Rush Soccer’s newer clubs based in San Juan, Puerto Rico. He, along with Tiago Calvano, Director of International Affairs, spent several days with the club to help grow their understanding of the Rush Way and share information on the opportunities available to the youth in Puerto Rico that now now a part of the Rush family.

###

The Rush Select Program is designed to give extended opportunities to the elite level players in Rush. This allows the top players in individual clubs to play with players at and above their level. Domestically it gives older players additional opportunities to be recruited at college showcase events that perhaps their local club will not be invited to, and allow the younger players to compete against the best players in the country. The Rush Select teams also have the opportunity to travel internationally, training and playing games against local, regional and youth professional teams from various nations. There are international training programs and international tournaments of which both often include attendance to professional games including Champions League games. The immediate goal of the program is to win, so players are selected based on their ability to help the team win and not necessarily for the long term potential development. The long term goal is to identify and put players in a competitive environment for the potential selection for a Rush men's and women's professional team.