It takes Herculean efforts for soccer to rise from the land of football, oil and George W. Bush.

Last year Soccer America described the travails of players in El Paso, Texas, who traveled 10 hours to play ODP. We also featured the Flathead Force, a Montana team that drew players from all over that mammoth state and arrived a day early at tournaments, just to practice together.

But El Paso ODP players now participate 30 minutes away in Las Cruces, N.M., and the Force was only one team. Their problems pale beside the 12-team Midland Blast, a Texas club that battles geography, football and the indifference of much of the state’s soccer hierarchy.

Yet the Blast is winning that battle. Despite its barren location (“Drive 100 miles anywhere and all you see is cactus and oil pumps,” said director of coaching Shane Barden), the football fanaticism (University of Texas running back Cedric Benson led Midland Lee High School to a record three straight 5A titles) and the antipathy shown by Texas soccer organizations (more on that later), Midland soccer is excellent.

More than 85 Blast alumni have played college ball. Texas A&M’s Linsey Johnson made the 2001 Soccer America All-Freshman Team, Kellye Robertson is fighting for a spot with the U.S. U-16 national team, and, on the men’s side. Jeremy Piette participated in the MLS combine.

With the closest large cities – El Paso, Dallas and Austin – nearly five hours away, and Houston even farther, Blast players make enormous sacrifices to find competition. “Our kids do things no one else in the country is asked to do,” Barden said proudly.

The Blast, founded in 1989 by former Haitian national team star Manu Sanon, boasts 12 teams, from U-10 to U-19. There are seven paid coaches, including former Milwaukee Wave Tony Pierce. Yet without the commitment of players and parents, soccer would never join football, oil and George W. Bush on the list of Midland’s most famous exports.

Every Friday night in the fall and spring, the boys’ teams and accompanying parents pile into several Suburbans and drive for hours. They check into a hotel, play one game Saturday and another Sunday morning, then head several hundred miles back to Midland. The cost, including food, lodging and gas, can exceed $1,500 per player per season. League and referee fees and coaches’ per diems are extra; so are club dues of $850.

Travel is even more difficult for girls. Because Dallas’ Lake Highlands league does not allow the Blast to play Sunday games, they drive 300-plus miles Friday night, play two Saturday matches, then arrive home around midnight.

“We want to be in their league, so we do what they say,” Barden explained.

ODP players spend even more time and money. Blast members routinely drive to Dallas, in good weather and bad. Sometimes they find a training session has been canceled or only a few other players have bothered to appear.

“Drive 100 miles anywhere and all you see is cactus and oil pumps.”

– Shane Barden, Midland Blast director of coaching

The North Texas State Soccer Association has never scheduled an ODP practice or tryout in Midland, so the Blast brings coaches in to evaluate their players.

“We’re not whining,” said Barden. “It’s a battle we know we have to fight, and we fight it gladly.”

It’s a huge commitment for the Midland kids.

“I don’t know if I’d have done that when I was in high school, and now we’ve got U-10s doing it,” said Barden. “We’re not going to win these leagues. We won’t beat teams like the Texans. We know it – but we don’t care. By playing them, we’re getting better. And we think we win just by qualifying for their leagues.”

What is the Blast’s secret? “Simplicity,” Barden said. “We teach a very simple style of play. A regional coach once told one of our girls, ‘You play too simple.’ Well, [Scottish national coach] Craig Brown has said he wished his team played more simply. We don’t always get the best athletes, so development of a simple style is important to us.”

The Blast pays for expert clinicians, like Dave Simeone and Butch Lauffer, to run two-day camps. Kelme is a major sponsor.

Once a year the Blast showcases its U-17 and U-19 players and other top teams such as the Memphis Rangers in a Coaches Classic. The club pays hotel, meal and local costs, plus travel reimbursement up to $150, for all college coaches. Last year more than 80 coaches, from as far as Pittsburgh, attended.

It’s all part of what makes the Blast unique.

“I have the greatest respect for the top clubs in the country, like the Texans and [Colorado] Rush,” Barden said. “But be honest, how hard is it to get the top 18 kids in Dallas or Denver to play for you? It’s a totally different situation here.”

Yet, as the Blast is proving, developing soccer in Midland is as important as in any more famous – and far less isolated – hotbed.

by Soccer America Youth Soccer Letter Executive Editor Dan Woog