Supporters
For more details on this topic, see Seattle Sounders FC supporters.The Sounders FC Alliance was established at the request of minority owner Drew Carey. Based on the fan association at FC Barcelona, members of the Alliance have the ability to vote on the removal of the General Manager and on other team decisions. Season ticket holders become automatic members, while non-season ticket holders may buy into the Alliance for a fee. Membership benefits include voting privileges, an invitation to the annual meeting and other team perks. Members can also be elected to the Sounders FC Alliance Council by receiving at least 25 nominations from other members on an annual basis. The first vote on retaining or replacing Sounders FC General Manager Adrian Hanauer is scheduled to be held in November 2012, following the club's fourth season. Drew Carey is the chairman of the Sounders FC Alliance.
Carey also requested that Sounders FC have their own marching band, the first of its kind in MLS. This led to the creation of the Sound Wave, a 53-member marching band consisting of brass and marching percussion. The band plays music from multiple genres, such as Latin, rock and pop, and sits on the north end of CenturyLink Field. The March to the Match, in which fans march from Occidental Park to CenturyLink Field before each home match, has been accompanied by the Sound Wave.
Besides the Alliance, there are currently five recognized, independent supporters groups for Sounders FC. Emerald City Supporters (ECS), which formed in 2005 to support the USL Sounders, is the largest supporter group and sits in the south end of the stadium in sections 121–123. SoCal Sound is an offshoot of ECS based in Southern California. The group attends Sounders matches played at The Home Depot Center in Carson, California. Gorilla FC is a Sounders FC supporters group that sits in the south end of CenturyLink Field in Sections 119 and 120. The North End Faithful sit in the north end of the stadium beneath the "Hawks Nest" in sections 100 and 144–152. Immortal Fury, formed in the fashion of South American torcidas, focuses on bringing color to the south end of the stadium by displaying the national flags of several countries.
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Famous quotes containing the word supporters:
“No Government can be long secure without a formidable Opposition. It reduces their supporters to that tractable number which can be managed by the joint influences of fruition and hope. It offers vengeance to the discontented, and distinction to the ambitious; and employs the energies of aspiring spirits, who otherwise may prove traitors in a division or assassins in a debate.”
—Benjamin Disraeli (1804–1881)
“His [O.J. Simpson’s] supporters lined the freeway to cheer him on Friday and commentators talked about his tragedy. Did those people see the photographs of the crime scene and the great blackening pools of blood seeping into the sidewalk? Did battered women watch all this on television and realize more vividly than ever before that their lives were cheap and their pain inconsequential?”
—Anna Quindlen (b. 1952)
“The opposition is indispensable. A good statesman, like any other sensible human being, always learns more from his opponents than from his fervent supporters. For his supporters will push him to disaster unless his opponents show him where the dangers are. So if he is wise he will often pray to be delivered from his friends, because they will ruin him. But though it hurts, he ought also to pray never to be left without opponents; for they keep him on the path of reason and good sense.”
—Walter Lippmann (1889–1974)