The Olympic Development Program (ODP) is a national program which is designed to identify and develop talented, committed youth soccer players to represent their state, region, and country in soccer competitions.  It is also intended to prepare and showcase the players as student/athletes for exposure to professional and collegiate soccer programs.  It is clear that the Portland Timbers and Oregon Youth Soccer Association (“OYSA”) ODP program have similar objectives for the Elite Player in their geographical area and will work together to achieve this mission.

Through a collaborative effort between the Portland Timbers, Portland Thorns FC and OYSA ODP Program, Oregon will have a nationally recognized ODP program and the Portland Timbers MLS franchise with a cutting-edge youth development and academy system.  In addition, this will provide an integrated pathway to developing necessary home-grown talent to support MLS objectives and lessen the future cost for the organization identifying and paying for players from outside the market and even the country.

To achieve this aim, the Portland Timbers Academy Director/OYSA Technical Director will develop this program with the continued support of the community.

The principal Portland Timbers/PortlandThorns FC/OYSA ODP mission is to identify, evaluate, and provide more consistent training opportunities for the elite male youth soccer players in Oregon.  As part of the national effort, the Portland Timbers/Portland Thorns FC/OYSA ODP program is dedicated to developing the highest level of youth soccer in the state and Portland Timbers homegrown territory.  This objective will be achieved in an atmosphere of integrity, fairness, and impartiality.  The player's talent with a ball, their physical and cognitive skills, together with their attitude will be the criteria for entry into the program.  In developing this collaborative program, both entities will ensure that the procedures will not conflict with any current United States Youth Soccer (USYS),United States Soccer Federation (USSF) policies or any NCAA eligibility rules for college entry.

There are inherent secondary objectives too:

• To evaluate and select players regionally in each ODP/Pre Academy age group that will train and then be evaluated to select a state pool of players from which state team players are then identified and state Timbers-Thorns-ODP teams formed.
• To advance the soccer skills and knowledge of players and coaches in each Timbers-Thorns-ODP age group, to send back to their club teams to share and develop.
• To provide appropriate competition for state Timbers-Thorns-ODP teams in each age group.

While individual leagues or districts may have additional objectives for their local programs, those objectives will not adversely affect the success of the Timbers-Thorns-ODP Academy. In fact, they will complement one another. 

ODP participation does not mean that the players cannot participate on their club team.  On the contrary, Timbers-Thorns-ODP participation, whether at the pool, state, regional, or national level, is concurrent with club team participation.  A mutually agreed upon training calendar will be implemented.  Participation at this elite level provides many advantages for the clubs too, such as exposure.  The advantages of player development outweigh any conflicts this might pose and indeed criteria will be produced to protect the club from poaching or recruiting within the soccer year.