Travel within the United States

To obtain permission for your team to travel to a tournament with NJYS sanctioning within the United States, you must complete an Application to Travel form and have it approved by the NJYS Office. You can obtain the form from our website  [pdf] or the NJYS office.

When completing the form, please make sure that the tournament to which you are traveling will accept your level of team in their competition. Please review the approved Permission to Host Agreement that the tournament must send you for the following:

1.  Make sure you don't have an overage player on the team. While some New Jersey leagues have two year divisions, most tournaments do not.  If you are a Division IV, U12 team, you cannot play in an U11 tournament even though you may play U11 teams in your league play.

2.  Review the level of teams being invited. If you are a lower division league team, you may have problems at a tournament that is inviting state select teams. Call the tournament director for advice. Click here for a list of US Youth Soccer Recommended Definitions of Teams.

3. Most tournaments are for club teams. That is, the teams that you play against in your regular league games. Some tournaments will allow a limited number of guest players to play with a club team (usually no more than three) at a tournament. That team now becomes a tournament team.

4. A guest player is defined as a registered player carded to another travel team. The guest player must obtain the permission of their coach to play as a guest with another team. If their team is playing in any tournament at the same time as a player wishes to guest play, the player is required to play with their own team and may not guest play with another team. The coach may deny the request to guest play.

5.  However, before you consider taking guest players, make sure the approved Permission to Host Agreement allows guest players. If the Permission to Host Agreement does not specify that you can have guest players, NJYS can not approve your permission to travel with guest players. Regardless of the tournament specifications, NJYS will not allow more than five guest players on a tournament team.  Guest player roster forms may be obtained from the NJYS Office.

6. Select teams must be either an official league select team of one of our traveling leagues or a NJYS select team. We will not give permission to travel for any other kind of select team. Teams that are a group of players just getting together to play a tournament are not recognized by NJYS.  Please do not ask us for permission to travel for such a team.

7. You must have an approved Application to Travel before you travel outside of New Jersey. If you travel without permission, your players are not covered by our insurance.

8. Small sided teams may only participate in non results oriented tournaments. Non results oriented tournaments are tournaments that do not provide trophies for winners or post competition scores. Participation awards may be given.

9. Small sided teams can only travel to tournaments that offer small sided games.   A small sided team cannot grow to a full sided team to play in tournaments.  They must play small sided games.

10.  Do not exceed the number of guest players permitted by the tournament or the NJYS five guest player limit.

The following documents should be submitted to the NJYS Office when requesting Permission to Travel.

• Completed Application to Travel form
• One copy of your team roster
• One copy of any Player/Coach Status forms that may have modified your roster
• One copy of the approved Permission to Host form from the host organization.  A statement from a travel agency is not acceptable.
• Code of Conduct form signed by the coach
• One copy of the Guest Player Roster for all guest players going to the tournament
• One stamped envelope addressed to the coach
• One stamped envelope addressed to the tournament

There is no fee for travel sanctioning.
 

Travel Outside of the United States

If you are traveling outside of the United States, you must obtain permission from New Jersey Youth Soccer and the United States Soccer Federation.  Please review all the concerns of traveling listed above along with all the additional problems of traveling out of the country.  To obtain permission from NJYS, follow the instructions about for travel within the United States.

To obtain permission from NJYS to travel outside of the United States, complete the Application to Travel and submit the form to NJYS.  See above for instructions to complete the form.

To obtain permission from US Soccer to travel outside of the United States, complete the US Soccer Application for Foreign Travel form. The following documents should be submitted to US Soccer:

• Completed US Soccer Federation Application for Foreign Travel form.  This is a four-part form available from the NJYS Office.
• A copy of the official brochure, pamphlet, invitation or other applicable material of the Tournament or Games host.  In many cases, a formal Permission to Host form may not exist from the foreign country.  You must then obtain a document from the National Federation of the country to which you are traveling stating that they have agreed to the competition.  A statement from a travel agency is not acceptable.
• A copy of your team roster and any Player/Coach Status forms that may have modified your roster.
• Checks for the following:

• $25.00 per team made payable to the US Soccer Federation
• Any applicable US Soccer Federation late fees
• A signed Ted Stevens Olympic and Amateur Sports Act compliance form

These items must be sent to the USSF for approval at least 90 days before the departure date.
 

Responsibilities of Travel

When you travel outside of New Jersey, you not only represent yourself and your club, but New Jersey Youth Soccer as well. We expect that teams will comply with all the rules of the competition and behave properly. NJYS receives tournament reports from all tournaments that New Jersey teams travel to. If we receive a report that one of your team members was a discipline problem at a tournament, NJYS will review the incident and will impose penalties as if the incident had happened within New Jersey. A copy of the tournament report will be sent to your Travel League President.  Further, teams that are constant offenders at tournaments may be denied permission to travel to future tournaments.

Coaches who travel with teams should be aware of their responsibilities when traveling with a team to a tournament.  Some of the concerns that have arisen from previous experiences:

1. Coaches must assure that there is an adult available with the players at all times. Situations have arisen where all the coaches with a team went to dinner and left the players alone in a dorm. A player was injured and significant time was lost in treating the player because a responsible adult was not available.

2. Coaches must make sure that there is no alcohol in any of the dorm or hotel rooms of any of the players.

3. Teams with older players may rent vehicles while away on a trip. Coaches must be aware that most rental agreements with car companies prohibit people under the age of 25 from driving rented vehicles.

4. Hotels expect players to behave and not cause damage to the hotel. Many tournaments, including the Regional Cup and Regional ODP tournaments are adopting Code of Conducts for the players. Coaches should impress on players the need to behave when away on trips.

Home     ODP     National Championship Series        Recreation Programs     Coaching Education   Coaches' Corner
WorkShop     Travel and Tournaments     Awards     Outreach Programs     Referee     Administrative     Links

New Jersey Youth Soccer
569 Abbington Drive, Suite 5
East Windsor, NJ  08520
Contact us at: office@NJYouthSoccer.com
609-490-0725    609-490-0731 (Fax)
This page last modified on November 05, 2008
 © 1998-2008 New Jersey Youth Soccer