4/30/2010: Orange Legion Seating

Just go to where the two Orange banners will be on the visiting side of Miami Valley South Stadium. It may or may not be roped off for supporters. The first two weeks we won't likely meet up beforehand at MacIntosh's or another bar because the games are on a Friday, we'll probably start meeting on Saturday's behorehand starting with the second game in May.

4/30/2010: On The Docket- Global United Events

Bas Ent and company will square off tonight against former professional stars with experience in the World Cup and/or Champions League.

** Last night the Global United players arrived, either from the Dayton or Cincinnati airports. Some were at the 7:30 press conference at the Greene and others were still making it into town, such as New Zealand's top soccer player in the country's history, former Werder Bremen player Winton Rufer. Who was delayed followed up with another delay; as I couldn't seem to find him at the Cincinnati Airport for a bit. But, everything worked out and nearly all the Global United players arrived in time for a dinner after the press conference at McCormick & Schmicks. Then all the players went home and got some rest for today's game.



**Today some Global United & Dayton Dutch Lions players went to Incarnation School in Centerville, Ohio this morning to give a presentation on Global Climate Change.

**That will be followed up by a lunch at noon today at the Dayton Racquet Club downtown.


Racquet Club's wine room.

**The afternoon will consist of some downtime for the players of both teams as they prepare for tonight's 7 p.m. kickoff at Bellbrook's Miami Valley South Stadium.

4/28/2010: Banner Pictures

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

4/28/2010: Directions For Banner Making Tonight

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.

4/28/2010: Game Notes- Dutch Lions Late Offensive Surge Overwhelms Cincinnati Bearcats, Lions Win 3-2

Team photo taken last night at UC's Gettler Stadium

The Dayton Dutch Lions beat the University of Cincinnati Bearcats 3-2 last night, winning the game late off of two solid, goal scoring efforts by Americans Steven McCarthy and Eric Kissinger. The Lions comeback was fueled with exciting, high attacking pressure. As with 10 minutes remaining in the second half the Lions were down 2-1, but McCarthy took a nice pass from den Ouden and then muscled his way around a Bearcats defender and struck the ball with his left foot to make it 2-2.

McCarthy on his strong armed effort:
"I feel really good about it. Bret played a good ball up top, Geert flicked it on, and I was able to run on to it and find the back of the net."

You could feel the momentum shift onto the Dutch Lions side after the McCarthy goal, as the Dutch Lions (were looking like Flying Dutchmen after that) hitting the post two minutes later via a thunderous shot from Bas Ent that rebounded off the woodwork to trialist Miguel Gonzalez, who shot as well, but was also denied by the parrying Bearcat keeper. However, the deadlock didn't last too long; as Eric Kissinger scored 5 minutes after McCarthy, with what can only be described as a Ronaldinho-esque bomb. *You'll see that once we get the highlights up.

Eric Kissinger on the setup to his Ronaldinho inspired golazo:
"The ball came out nicely, got a good first touch and there was nothing open wide. I had a straight angle to the goal and it flew true."

On if he has anymore of those type of goals in him and how he felt to score his first Dutch Lion goal in that fashion:
"Number one: that's going to be hard to top. Number two: I think I needed that, I had a few mistakes in defense to make up for. So, it definitely helped to provide on the offensive end."

Earlier in that Second Half, Dutch striker Geert den Ouden also scored for the Dutch Lions tying the game at 1-1 with the first goal. Den Ouden notched both a goal and an assist in the game. For the opponents, the Cincinnati Bearcats had a good goal in the second half, right after den Ouden's goal, to go up 2-1 at the time. In the First Half, Cincinnati scored on a communication fluke goal that rolled into the Dutch Lions net making it 1-0 UC early on. The goal resulted from a communication problem between Moens and an American defender who were on different pages on a throw-in that was deflected into the Lions net.

Overall, the first half was not pretty but the second half showed some great promise for The Lions (who appear so far to be a second half team that starts slow). The Lions had the majority of the possession and chances in both halves (but especially the second), and it seemed that the Lions finally have learned how to convert those chances as the second half went on. In retrospect, not a bad building result for a team just going into their third week; as 3-2 against Cincinnati (with one fluke goal for the Bearcats) was better than a 1-1 tie with Xavier. As Cincinnati is a pretty good college team who were undefeated in Spring soccer (prior to facing the Dutch Lions) with a nice win over Kentucky 3-0 recently and a 1-1 tie of Indiana University (one of the top soccer colleges in the U.S.A.).

The Lions look to continue gaining form this Friday at their home stadium, Bellbrook High School, against Global United at 7:00 p.m.

**Apoligies for the delay in posting about the game. Been messing with the video highlights of yesterday's game, all day today so far as a computer error will not allow us to upload the footage. Once we get the footage up it will be on here.

** By the way, reminder Banner making is tonight at 6:30, click here for more details.

4/27/2010: Former New England Revs, U.S. U-20 Player Miguel Gonzalez on Trial

22 year old, Mexican-American player Miguel Gonzalez from Miami, Florida was the youngest player ever to join the New England Revolution at 18 years of age in 2006. Gonzalez has also played for the Santos Laguna youth academy prior to joining the New England Revolution. The left midfielder also has 4 caps with the U.S. U-20 National Team, scoring 2 goals in the process. Now he is on trial with the Dayton Dutch Lions.

Gonzalez last played for the Bradenton Academics of the PDL (who are connected to the Bradenton IMG Academy). Gonzalez should get some time in the game tonight against the University of Cincinnati.

4/27/2010: Join Global United & Dutch Lions Players At The Wine Loft After Friday's Game

Join the players of Global United and the players and staff of the Dayton Dutch Lions at The Wine Loft after Friday's game between 10 p.m. to midnight. There you can tell world stars Marco Etcheverry & Fernando Couto, as well as Dutch Lions stars Geert den Ouden and Oscar Moens good game over wine and appetizers. Not only that, if you're at the game Friday night, you can take your ticket voucher to The Wine Loft after the game to get "buy one appetizer, get one free!"

The Wine Loft is located near the main entrance to The Greene, right next to The Pub. Exterior image if you take a wrong turn:

4/26/2010: Marco Etcheverry (Arguably The Best MLS, D.C. United, and Bolivian Player In History) Joins Global United Roster

Marco Etcheverry (quite arguably the best MLS, D.C. United, and Bolivian player in history) joins the Global United squad that will play the Dayton Dutch Lions this Friday at Bellbrook's Miami Valley South Stadium.

Etcheverry had 190 caps and 34 goals for D.C. United between 1996 to 2003. Marco also played 71 times for Bolivia in the 90's until 2003, scoring 13 goals. Etcheverry scored in the 1994 World Cup against Brazil and was also awarded in 2006 with the Medal of Merit by the Bolivian Congress. Etcheverry also played successfully in Colombia and back in Bolivia.

Tribute video to Etcheverry:

4/26/2010: Dayton Dutch Lions Take On Bearcats Tomorrow

VS.

AT UC's GETTLER STADIUM


Dayton Dutch Lions will take on Division-I college side Cincinnati tomorrow in preparations for Global United, as well as the Dutch Lions regular season. The game takes place tomorrow at 7:30 p.m. at Gettler Stadium (pictured above). The Cincinnati Bearcats are undefeated so far in Spring soccer, challenged one of the top college sides in the U.S.A. in Indiana University to a 1-1 draw recently this Spring, also recently pummeled Kentucky 3-0, and look poised to improve on their 8-10 record from last season.

The friendly scrimmage is open to the public and similiar to last week I'll have an in depth report on how the game went. I'll also have markedly improved video highlights (as we got our professional cameras in yesterday) and interviews. So, check out the reports here tomorrow night.

4/26/2010: Your Brillant Orange Moment Of The Day

I understood a little about Dutch soccer before this whole Dayton Dutch Lions adventure; Mainly that Ajax had some awesome teams back in the day, I could do a mean Cruyff turn (and that's about it I could do mean) in my footballing career, the Dutch like to attack, Edgar Davids is a player I admired (who was part of the reason I chose Tottenham as my new team when I was in England in 2005), and that the Dutch National Team has a keen way of being brillant but losing in the end. I learned a bit more about Dutch soccer history when I purveyed the Sports Section at Borders in the Dayton Mall and picked up Brillant Orange: The Neurotic Genius of Dutch Soccer by David Winner, which has been tying up some of the loose ends for me.

As whenever I get a free hour of relaxing, I'm usually reading a soccer book. And, in this book when Winner points out a sweet goal, I usually hop on youtube to check it out. Since I likely snatched up the one copy of Winner's book in all of Dayton, I'll put up these posts once in a while on Dutch soccer history with some youtube clips.. I pretty much have the U.S. Soccer history down because I'm a U.S. Soccer nut, and since half the team is Dutch a good window in how they think and operate in soccer, is to learn some of their history. The history will not usually be in order, so bare with me.

1978 World Cup Dutch National Team

Not considered as good or total (at least in Holland) as the 1974 Dutch National Team that forgot to score the second goal in the 1974 final against West Germany and eventually lost that final 2-1. The 1978 World Cup Team still reached the final far away in Argentina, despite having two stars- both Cruyff and van Hanegem- missing from the squad. Both of those factors may have made it a larger achievement but most Dutch don't consider it as good of a team.

The 1978 World Cup Team struggled in the group stages. As after they dispatched Iran in the opening game off of a hat trick from Rob Rensenbrink, an excellent left winger for Belgium's Anderlecht who had 143 goals in 260 games from midfield for Belgium's top club at the time (but was never considered as good just because most of Holland never saw him play regularly; Rensenbrink also played one season for the Portland Timbers in 1980), the Dutch then went on to tie group winners Peru and having to rely on a late Johnny Rep goal to make it past Scotland on goal differential (despite losing that game 3-2).

Johnny's on the spot goal was crucial to get Holland to the second round group:


In the second round the Dutch got going with a 5-1 demolition of Austria (with goals from Brandts, Rensenbrink, two from Rep, and van de Kerkof rounding things out). They followed that up with a 2-2 tie against West Germany (the team they lost to in the 74' final) with van de Kerkof and Haan scoring.

Haan's goal in the game against West Germany was especially sweet:


In the final, second round group game (which was essentially the semi-final with the winner of The Netherlands v. Italy going to the final) the Dutch won 2-1 thanks to goals from Brandts (and not so thanks when Brandts also bizarrely scored for Italy) and another stunning long range effort from Haan.

From Brillant Orange:
Brandts scored, bizarrely for both sides, before Haan settled it with arguably the greatest long-range goal of all time, beating Dino Zoff with a straight drive that was still rising as it went in off the post despite being struck from near the centre-circle. (Nearly twenty years later, when I spoke to Haan by phone on a bad line to Greece, where he was coaching Thessaloniki, I mentioned that I got goosebumps whenever I saw that goal shown on television. He said: 'So do I,' as if some higher power then his right leg was responsible, and I immediately got goosebumps again.)

Haan's goal against Italy that sent the Dutch to the Final:


In the final against Argentina, in Argentina, there was a volatile atmosphere. The Dutch on the way to the stadium were delayed by thousands pounding on their bus, chanting "Argentina! Argentina!" Despite this the Dutch were tied 1-1 through 90 minutes, and Ruud Krol was only inches from scoring the winner near the 88th minute. However, the Dutch said even if Krol would have scored the referee would have awarded Argentina a penalty and if the Dutch somehow won they wouldn't get out of the stadium alive. That is how bad the crowd was.

The Argentinians won the final 3-1 in extra time off of goals from Kempes and Daniel Bertoni (who will actually be playing in the Global United game for Global United):


I'll get to a short history on the 1974 team and other teams in the upcoming weeks.

4/25/2010: Dayton Dutch Lions Head Coach Sonny Silooy Is Ajax Legend, Star In Holland

Dayton Dutch Lions headman Sonny Silooy (in Dutch Lions practice on left, picture by Ron Alvey) was a legendary player at Ajax and also received 25 caps with Holland- always a tough international squad to break into.

The Head Coach of the Dutch Lions, Sonny Silooy, finally arrived in Dayton this past Wednesday and despite exhaustion from delays and the long flight, went straight to work. Silooy is quite the legendary player in Holland and this experience should help the Dayton Dutch Lion players- no matter whether they hail from Dayton or Rotterdam.

Overall, Silooy spent 13 years at Ajax during his playing career, gaining an astonishing 267 caps at the Amsterdam club (Ajax ws one of the top clubs in the World at the time, especially in the mid 90's). Overall, Silooy had 400 caps in the top flights of the Netherlands, Germany, and France while garnering 25 Dutch caps. Silooy looks to also build on his coaching experience with the Dayton Dutch Lions. Silooy started coaching soccer in 2006 with a two year stint as Ajax's youth coach.

For a full article by the Dayton Daily News on Silooy's arrival, click here.

4/25/2010: Owner Mike Mossel Pleased To See Dreams Come Together In Dayton

After battling volcanic ash to finally get in the country, Co-Owner Mike Mossel (above) is happy to see things finally coming together here in Dayton.

Mike Mossel, as he watched the Dayton Dutch Lions scrimmage a U-19 side on Saturday:
“It’s kind of crazy. To see some of the guys we have playing here in Dayton, Ohio, and knowing how far we’ve come, it’s a great feeling.”

Comment from Dayton Daily News article by Kyle Nagel, for the entire story click here.

4/25/2010: Banter & Personalities Coming Together Well Within Dutch Lions Squad

The senior Dutch & American players in the squad, Bret Jones (left) and Oscar Moens (right), have kept the serious manner of the Dutch Lions's practices light with some banter.

I have already personally noticied the near seemless transition, between the American and Dutch players at the Dayton Dutch Lions when it comes to becoming good teammates, whether it be in practice or when they're hanging out together off of the field. Dayton Daily News's Writer Kyle Nagel has noticed much of the same in a lighthearted moment between Jones and Moens:

Bret Jones was walking toward a reporter to discuss the area’s new professional soccer venture just as renowned Dutch goalkeeper Oscar Moens was walking away.

“This guy,” Moens cracked while pointing to Jones, “he jumps like a monkey!”

Jones, a Xenia High School and Wright State product, laughed. Then Moens, the 6-foot-3 keeper, began jumping around and waving his arms in a lighthearted moment.

Xenia product Bret Jones on coming together with the Dutch players:

“Any time you have a new club and new players, it takes some getting used to,” Jones said. “But this hasn’t been a problem. They didn’t come in saying, ‘I’m from Holland, I know soccer’ and putting themselves on a pedestal,” Jones said. “We’re learning as much from them as we can, and hopefully they can learn from us.”

Former Dutch National Team keeper Moens concurs:

“It has been good,” Moens said. “We learn from them, and they learn from us.”

For the full article, click here.

4/25/2010: Local Player Alex VanderSluijs's Interesting Path To The Dutch Lions

Alex VanderSluijs try out wasn't exactly planned.

From Dayton Daily News's Writer Kyle Nagel:
Alex Van der Sluijs, a 25-year-old former Carroll High School and Wilmington College standout, assumed his playing career was all but over. But his brother had an idea.

Derek van der Sluijs, 15 months older, had been hired as business manager of the Dayton Dutch Lions, a first-year team in the Premier Development League division of the United Soccer Leagues. The Dutch Lions were still looking for players, and Derek nudged Alex toward the tryout happening the same day in Bellbrook.

“Well, I had come (with) cleats in the car,” Alex said. “I’ve tried to stay fit and still love to play, so I hopped in the game.”

Alex, signed to a contract soon after, is an example of local players benefiting from the professional soccer opportunity.

For the full article click here

4/25/2010: Banner Making Session Details- 6:30 P.M., Wednesday April 28th

**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

4/24/2010: DDL F.C. v. Global United Highlight Reel

Sa Pinto and company will face off against the Dayton Dutch Lions on April 30th.



What player out of the bunch so far are you most impressed with? By the way, I hear some of the final couple of signings will likely be the biggest ones. So, if you don't have them yet.. Get your tickets for Global United now before it sells out.

4/23/2010: Your Dutch Lions

********* **********

YOUR 2010 DAYTON DUTCH LIONS

Click on Picture for bio.

Pics by Jacq Roos

4/23/2010: Brazilian World Cup Winner Zinho Signs Up With Global United To Face Off Against Dayton Dutch Lions

The 42 year old, former 1994 Brazilian World Cup winner Zinho has signed on to play for Global United against the Dayton Dutch Lions in an exhibition to be held on April 30th, at 7:30 p.m. at Bellbrook High School. The experienced Zinho has aged well and played professionally until the age of 40, with over 480 professional club caps (along with 81 goals). Zinho also received 57 caps (with 7 goals) for Brazil from 1989 to 1998, Zinho was a World Cup winner with Brazil in 1994.

Most recently, the Brazilian maestro has played and managed for Miami F.C. since 2005, as a player-assistant manager.

Here's some videos of Zinho doing his thing:

4/23/2010: Former USA International & Colorado Rapids Manager Clavijo Joins Global United

Most of today's American soccer fans would know Frenando Clavijo best for his head coaching stint in Major League Soccer with the Colorado Rapids between 2005-2008. During that stint Clavijo had some incredible highs, as well as some discouraging lows, at the Rapid helm. Either way, no one would consider Clavijo as a boring manager; as Frenando was a coach who played by his own rules and was a very colorful character on the sidelines.

The 54 year old Clavijo was a former USA National team defender. Clavijo was born in Uruguay and his family immigrated to America at a young age. Clavijo, interestingly enough, got all 61 of his USA caps between 1990-1994 while playing indoor soccer. Clavijo has also coached internationally as an Assistant during the 1998 World Cup for Nigeria and as Head Coach of Haiti. His last managerial job was in 2009 with Miami F.C.

4/22/2010: Rangers & Scottish Legend Richard Gough & Ghana Legend Yaw Preko Join Global United

Richard Gough had a total of 61 caps for the Scottish National Team. He also played for top clubs such as Tottenham, Rangers, Dundee United, Everton, and Nottingham Forest. During his career he was Captain of Tottenham in the 1987 FA Cup Final against Coventry City. Gough also played a total of 318 league games for Rangers alone, scoring 26 goals. Further, Gough played 36 games in MLS with the Kansas City Wizards in 1997 before making a surprising European comeback with Rangers in 1998. Then back to MLS in 1999 with the San Jose Clash before making an even more surprising two season comeback with Everton of the EPL from 1999-2001 to close out his career.

Richard Gough ties up the score for Rangers in the Old Firm match against Celtic~


Yaw Preko has played just about everywhere from Ghana, to Belgium, to Turkey, to Sweden, to Saudia Arabia, and finally stopping off in Vietnam in 2007. Preko had his best success with Anderlecht in the 90's where he scored 27 goals in 92 appearances. Preko also has 98 international caps with Ghana.

Preko scores two for Anderlecht~