Orange Legionnaire

**Crew are contracted to play their starters for 60 minutes in Saturday's contest, and would probably look to give their starters a lot of time even if they were not; as it's been a while since the Crew's last game and they need to look to get game fit before their matchup on June 26th against D.C. United. Some Crew supporters are a little iffy about paying the $20 bucks, when most home games in the Nordecke are less than that. However, the Dutch Lions have a lot of players that have played in the Eresdivise and it should be a good match with an intimate atmosphere. Should also be interesting to see what the Crew do to prepare themselves for D.C. United as they try to right their season.

**The Orange Legion has a lot of banners in their section, likewise the Crew have a ton in theirs. I thought it would be cool to make one end just Nordecke and Orange Legion, just a party down there with both the banners we have here and the Nordecke's banners. Since there really is no rivalry there and nearly the whole section are fans of both clubs, could be a fun day out. We'll have a walk through of Baujan Field on Friday and I'll mark out an area for this, at the gate just say you're with The Orange Legion or Nordecke and someone should be able to direct you to this area. Or just look for the banners, every $20 dollar ticket is general admission.

**Also, there is a great bar with friendly staff at the Dublin Pub downtown (not far from the stadium) where World Cup can be watched, make a day out of it.

**I was texted a few weeks ago by Crew supporters and I gave them the number to call of a guy who had more authority than me to get a group rate done. I'm sure he could have worked out a cheaper group rate at that time, still possible if were not soldout before game time. I didn't know a group rate off hand at the time because frankly we never have away supporters in the PDL and most of our "groups" get in half priced. But, nothing was followed through with from Nordecke's supporters groups. If someone is still looking to work out a rate from the Crew supporters, email me at r.kozlowski@dutchlionsfc.com and how many Crew fans are looking to come from the Nordecke and maybe it will be possible to work something out before game time.

I can't make any promises though as it's four days before.

**Dutch Lions fans will have a banner making session Friday night at 6:30 p.m., as we'll make a few things for the Crew game on Saturday. It will be at the 4123 N. Linda Drive address, same as usual. I cannot do it earlier because I'm traveling from Dayton to Rochester to Niagara Falls to Cleveland back to Dayton with the club this week and won't be back until 2 a.m. Thursday night.

**Overall, I think it will be a fun day out, good intimate atmosphere as will likely try to pack 2,200 into Baujan which only seats 1,700. Hope to see many fans from both sides.

**If you have any questions email me at crewture@live.com or r.kozlowski@dutchlionsfc.com.

Because of the U.S.A. National team World Cup warmup against the Czech Republic tonight at 7:30, we'll have our banner making at 5:30 tonight (instead of the usual 6:30) and make our banners in two hours. The address of the place where we are making the banners is at 4123 N. Linda Dr. in Bellbrook, Ohio. We'll have beer and maybe some pizza. Mapquest it from your location!

We took a break this week from banner making since we didn't have a game on Saturday. We'll start back up with more banners next week on Tuesday, May 25th at 6:30 p.m. The address of the place where we are making the banners is at 4123 N. Linda Dr. in Bellbrook, Ohio. We'll have beer and maybe some pizza. Mapquest it from your location!

Example of a two stick or two pole banner. Basically two PVC poles with the artwork adhered in between, then held up over your head:


Some two stick banners we made last night (with the references to the right), were making some more tonight at the 4123 N. Linda Drive address in Bellbrook, OH a little after 5 p.m.:
D.Y.T. (Dayton) 'til I D.I.E.




The Cleveland Internationals mascot is a globe. No joke:

The above are some low quality pictures (snapped with my cellphone) of the banners we made last night at The Orange Legion's weekly banner making session. We'll have some high-quality pictures up likely later tonight, I'm just waiting on them to be sent to my email.

The banners for this week are the same size of last week's banners. We'll also make four or five two sticks Thursday afternoon. This brings our total to four large banners and four or five two sticks for the Kings game.

The first banner above is a Dutch Lion orientated banner and the second banner is a Anti-Cincinnati Kings banner, with as you can sort of make out the King from the Burger King commercials.

** Were moving up the banner making session this weekend to Tuesday, May 4th at 6:30 p.m. since I can't do it Wednesday night or Thursday night because of finals.

** Our goal is to make at least two banners a week, so eventually we have the whole visitors stand covered with banners. We'll likely make 2 banners Tuesday night, as well as four two sticks. The cost this week will be extremely low since we have one more large sheet left over from last weekend and tons of paint. So, all we need to buy is two queen size sheets, for a second large banner plus some two sticks, this will only cost 28 bucks total this week.. Which means with 10 to 15 of us in attendance to paint, the most each of us will need to chip in is like 2 or 3 bucks a person. The address is the same 4123 N. Linda Dr. in Bellbrook, Ohio. MAPQUEST IT!

** Some people questioned the location of our section since were still a relatively small group and if the sun is shining it can be annoying to sit there, etc. There are a couple of reasons why we are over where we are at.

~First off, were supposed to be Ultras (hardcore soccer support) so if your complaining about a little sun your in the wrong section anyways.

~Secondly, the stands directly behind goal do not have room for even the two banners we already made.

~Third, there is much more freedom being in an isolated corner farther away from the main stands then closer to the main group of fans, where there are mainly families. This make swearing and etc. less of an issue. Let's just keep it enjoyable for us and them by staying where we are at.

~Fourth, I heard that the Bellbrook officials won't allow us behind the one goal anyways.

~Fifth, I and many others in the section really liked the vibe we had going on the last week. Moving may ruin it, similiar to how moving the Nordecke would do it in Columbus. I like the freedom and that basically the whole visiting stands our are's. They were barely filled, except for us, during the Global United game. And, I would be happily surprised if we get more then 3,000 against the Cincinnati Kings.

So, overall, were staying where we are at. I have confidence our numbers are going to grow by the week and I want the whole visiting stands filled with our banners by week three or four. We want to make it a party that Amsterdam could be proud of over there. :-)



** Dayton Dutch Lions ruggedly handsome, defensive midfielder Yohan Wigger requested that we stick around longer the next game so that the team can come over and give us a clap or bow (similiar to how the Crew do it in Columbus). So, we need to stick around for 5-10 minutes and continue chanting next Saturday.

** We got about 3 or 4 chants going last weekend. Not bad considering the Nordecke has been around for two more years and probably only has 4 or 5 more chants then that. While were doing the banners Tuesday night we need to work on thinking up more- I already have some ideas that I didn't bother to try last Friday because it was just an exhibition and we weren't as concerned with chanting as we would be for our regular season.

** When or if I get a chance, busy week for me with three finals, I'll go to MacIntosh's down the road and see if we can get any beer deals before games for supporters. Either way, some of us will meet there a few hours before the Cincinnati game to have a few beers, probably likely around 4:30. I'll probably have to have a beer, leave and set up a few things at the stadium, and come back. We'll see.

**I'll email this same thing out to everyone on the mailing list either tonight or earlier tomorrow. Want on The Orange Legion's mailing list, email us at theorangelegionnaire@live.com

That's it for now cheers and I hope to see you Tuesday night for banners and Saturday night at the game. Duey (Goodbye)!

Here are some pictures of the banners we made tonight for The Orange Legion:

I gave the address a few days back, but if you need turn by turn it's~
Take exit 7 on I-675. If coming from the South your going to take a right off the exit (if from the North your going to take a left off the exit). Go a mile once you've gotten off the exit and turn left on oh-725. Go a half-mile more turn left again onto North Linda Drive, it's 4123 North Linda Drive on the right.

Were starting tonight at 6:30 but stop by anytime even if you're just curious. Once most of us get there at 6:30 were going to pool together some money (like 10 bucks a piece) and pick up some banner supplies and beer.

See you there.

**The Orange Legion is having their first banner making session on Wednesday, April 28th at 6:30 p.m. The address of the place where we are making the banners is in the garage of a member at 4123 N. Linda Dr. in Bellbrook, Ohio. Mapquest it from your location.

We'll likely try to get a 12 pack of beer or two and some music. As this usually made it more enjoyable when we made these in Columbus.

**Everyone that shows up will need to pitch in $10 to $20 bucks if they can for supplies. I'll be throwing in at least $30 bucks. If you can't pitch in on supplies this time it is okay. But, please try to pitch in something. If we can get 10 to 15 guys to pitch in at least $10 bucks we should be able to make some good stuff.

**Once we get some money pooled together, some of us will go to Wal Mart to make the purchases (paint, paint brushes, drop clothes, and sheets).

**If anyone has a projector that we can borrow, please bring it. If not I'll try to get my hands on one by Wednesday. We could freehand some banners, but doing banners by projector is a lot faster and easier to achieve.

**I also made a facebook just for members that have sent me an email and are interested in being in the supporters group, click here to join.

**Also someone asked me about tickets for the section. The whole stadium is general admission. I'm going to talk to some of the people in the office about roping off an area for us starting with the Global United game. The area will be a small block to start off with and as the season goes on and we expand, we'll likely increase that block.

As we get more organized as a Supporters Group we'll talk to the front office about a ticket deal for us (or even about us selling our own tickets as the supporters in the Nordecke in Columbus do). Eventually, not sure about this year, we'll have specific tickets for our section. But, General Admission with a roped off section for us should do the trick for now.

**So, on Wednesday we'll likely make one medium sized banner with "Orange Legion" on it and some sort of design (like a Legionnaire on it). Then we will make at least one smaller banner and about 5 two sticks. That should be a good start for us this week and if we can achieve all of that in one night we'll be in good shape. Then we can look into making more things the week after for the Cincinnati Kings game.

**I'm also going to try to get a membership/about us page up on my website here sometime this week. I'll take pictures of us making banners, so after that I can add those pictures to this page, to hopefully entice others to join in our efforts.

**We also have some drums that we can likely paint orange as well on Wednesday.

**Any ideas? Thoughts? Chant ideas? Want to join up? Want to help with banners? Email us at theorangelegionnaire@live.com