Clearwater Chargers soccer club a model of excellence

Every year, the Clearwater Chargers Soccer Club comes together at the Safety Harbor Resort and Spa to support players who are moving on to compete at the college level.

This year's Class of 2011 totaled 20 boys and girls making their choices official, along with about 15 others expected to soon pick a program as well.

Beyond being a gathering to celebrate each year's gifted signees, last Wednesday's annual event also can represent the culmination of a developmental process far more complex than simply signing up for a team, playing a little soccer and hoping to someday get to this point.

The club is in its 40th year of training Suncoast youth soccer players. Peter Mannino, the club's longtime director of coaching, said Wednesday's signing event helps illuminate the club's continued success and growth.

"It's a process of many years of having a curriculum set for the different phases of players and their development," said Mannino, who has been director since 1992. "Without the kind of coaching staff that I've been fortunate to gather around me, some of our accomplishments wouldn't have come through."

East Lake High School boys coach Sergei Stopek is one of those Chargers coaches and he said Clearwater's ability to get the most out of an athlete is second to none.

"I think the biggest impact we've had is the overall development of the player," Stopek said. "We've had a lot of success with winning, but I think the true measuring stick is the amount of progress we've had in sending kids into the top colleges and sending kids down to the national program."

Chargers players often begin at the youth level and, if they stick with it, develop through to Under-18 and U19 teams. At the top of the boys level is the prestigious U.S. Soccer Federation Academy program, one of 78 such affiliations around the nation.

January's Major League Soccer SuperDraft, which saw former Chargers goalkeeper Zac MacMath go fifth overall to the Philadelphia Union, seemed to bear out Stopek's assessment of the club's impact. Just weeks before that, another Charger, Eugene Starikov, was added to the U.S. Soccer Federation men's national team training camp in California.

But before watching Chargers players like MacMath and Starikov go off to college, pro or national teams, the club's impact can also be seen at the high school level locally. While MacMath traveled from Bradenton to be a member of the Chargers, Starikov - like the majority of Clearwater athletes - played high school ball in Pinellas County.

"If you look at the local area and the high school programs, almost everyone has a roster with 50-60 percent Clearwater players and they impact those programs," Mannino said.

That impact can be represented by 11 combined boys and girls state titles since 2001. Only one year, 2008, was there not at least one Pinellas school playing in a state championship game.

"A lot of high schools benefit immensely from club soccer; I know we do with Palm Harbor," said Palm Harbor University High School girls head coach John Planamenta, whose Hurricanes have been crowned state champs three of out the past five seasons.

One big reason why the Clearwater club continues to thrive is its commitment to players at every stage of development, Mannino said.

"It's a top priority. With our U8-U12 teams, those are the golden years of these kids. There is a priority each year with getting better at really providing those ages with what they need so that our foundation as they come through stays strong."

The annual signing event is then all the justification Mannino needs for continuing that long commitment.

"This is what we want. Now that these kids have actually got to the point after nine, 10, 11 years of hard work paying off is really our main goal.

"To me there's nothing more gratifying than that."