no matter how much of a soccer prodigy you are at 9, you can't play on a team with 12 year olds.
polarbear
Not universally true. Rec programs are usually lock-step for age, but in competitive soccer, I know quite a few children who "play up" in our region (not just our specific community, but surrounding ones as well). You can't be "held back" in team sports, because of very strict reverse age cutoffs that come down from the national youth sports organizations, but you can play with older kids, if you can make the team. Plus there are all the club soccer teams, who actively recruit (read, poach) the best community players into very intense training.
I think the primary factor in soccer inequity is actually socioeconomic, as nearly everything is pay-to-play these days, versus the school-based, subsidized teams that once predominated among all school-age athletic programs.
