So who are you and what's your soccer story?

Currently I am Andre' P. Ruette, the owner & President of the Fall River Marksmen FC, and along with three other great people, we run the newly revived club.

Soccer or as I know the sport, football, has been apart of my life since I was born thanks to my father, a London born Arsenal season ticket holder. I played the game from a very, very early age up into my late teens when my other love, ice hockey took over my athletic duties. I moved to Ontario to try and become a professional hockey player at 17, an experience that helped me to understand how the professional side of sports work. In my late twenties, I found myself still thoroughly engaged and obsessed with football and was yearning to get involved with the sport in an operational or managerial aspect. At the time I was living in South Carolina and was lucky enough to become very friendly with the staff and owners of the Charleston Battery. It was through my experiences with them that I came up with a plan to create my own club and try to build something that would stand out, even then in the early 00's it was obvious the way our club/league system was being run was less then efficient and still mirroring the many issues that plagued the decades previous. I wound up moving out of South Carolina to South Florida to begin my plans for a club team when I managed by chance to bump into former MLS player Sneaky Pete Marino. We wound up becoming friends and partners in what would turn out to be a plan to run a club team (Treasure Coast Galleons), academy and our own semi-pro league. The league, Florida Elite Soccer League, grew in five years from five regional teams to twelve clubs based across the state. We also managed to host a few international friendly matches, including playing against Haiti & Bahama Natl teams, along with moving players into the professional world. There weren't many regional leagues like ours at the time and it brought about a good amount of resistance from teams and leagues that laid outside of our own, a definite eye opening experience in just how dysfunctional the inner workings of the domestic game was. My career outside of soccer eventually got the best of me though and we closed our league as my non-soccer career required my complete attention. I'm now back involved with the game due in part to seeing the domestic game continue to suffer from the same mistakes from decades past. I love this game too dearly to sit idly by and watch it continue to squander players and fans alike. Thankfully through my previous experiences I know you don't have to begrudgingly confide yourself within the accepted norm of US club soccer and with the Marksmen, I hope to show that.

Why rebuilding a brand instead of just doing something new?

To me the choice to bring back the Marksmen was an all too obvious one as opposed to being just another new club on the block. I was shocked when I found out that no one owned the name or the rights to the team and when I saw I could bring this beautiful story back to life and create more chapters in their history, I was sold instantly. I don't want to rely on the history of the club as our means to operate but being able to reignite the potential that lies within the city of Fall River & the South Coast is a challenge I couldn't not accept. The past is also not just a reminder of what was but also a reminder to myself that this club can't be average and that goes with the efforts and visions of those of who run the club, we have to push ourselves to be the best in everything we do so that we can rightfully call ourselves the Marksmen as well as standing as a reminder to the people of Fall River that our community still holds the power to be the best in the nation in all things we aspire to do.

Fall River has a history unmatched in American soccer, can you talk about that history and what stands out to you?

The history and accomplishments of this club still to this day allow it to remain as one of the greatest clubs in American history. It's crazy that in all this time, possibly only the Cosmos could triumph what the Marksmen managed to do. To me personally, what also makes so many of the accomplishments even sweeter was that it was done with a nice amount of players who were from the city with some even permanently resting within the city as well as having living relatives who still call Fall River home, a beautiful circle of life if you will.

Growing up in Northern New Jersey, our historical side of club soccer is also pretty hefty and for all of the amazing teams and players that were pumped out of North Jersey, there was always Fall River sitting right there with equal claims of fame and fortune, I always found that forever intriguing. Adding to my own intrigue of the Marksmen and the city of Fall River was I found myself visiting the city somewhat often due to family members who lived near by. If you appreciate history, you can't help but fall in love with a city like Fall River and the South Coast region. You can just feel the soul of the past still moving through the streets, the large brick and stone factories littered throughout the community along with so many other beautiful architectural offerings from yesteryear, it's a wonderful reminder of the potential that lies within the city.

How do you plan to connect the history to the current club?

We have a few exciting aspects that I can touch on at the moment, one them being is that we've managed to contact a few relatives of the former Marksmen and we hope to in the very least to bring them out for a match to honor their family members legacy's.

We're also we're working on announcing a club historian in the near future. It's our hope that the historian will act as an ambassador, educator and liaison to the clubs storied history & accomplishments of the past.

We have a few other items that will require some time to put into play but with a little luck and some patience we hope to announce a few other items by the end of the year, 2020, which we think would tie in nicely to the Marksmen of the past. The Marksmen used to host numerous high level friendly matches as well as their tour of Europe in 1930. We're in the midst of initial talks with a few overseas clubs with the hopes of putting together a tour as well as hosting a team or two in the coming year or so. I'm also looking into getting a store front in Fall River or at the site of the original Marks Stadium. This store front would act as a club shop and community gathering spot but the long term goal would be to turn it completely into a museum for soccer. The depth of the footballing history of Fall River & New England is so deep and so important, that I really want to not only help display & educate the public but turn this museum into a destination for people outside of the area to visit. I want our club to bring people to our community and shine some light on what Fall River stands for and what it can offer to the public. This all sounds nice and I'm hopeful to make this happen but I also know that we can't put the proverbial cart before the horse, so with fingers crossed, I hope to make some of the previously mentioned aspects come to fruition over the course of the next few years, if not sooner if the stars all align for us.

I'm also asked about Marks Stadium during these type of conversations (connecting the past)... all I can say at this time, is that we're talking with the land owners. If I could do only one thing that honors the past, having our season's played out on the original site would probably be my #1 choice.... don't hold your breath on this one but I can say talks have happened and I hope something positive comes out of these discussions.

You went with Icarus for your kit designs, can you talk about those and how you chose the style you did?

I'm a kit nerd myself, I probably have over 100 jerseys from across the world, so the creation of our kits really, really means a lot to me. I must of gone over the details of our home kit with Robert from Icarus over a thousand times, he's got a heart of gold and the patience of a monk. Given the club's history, it was only right that we unveiled a home kit that honored the past and wasn't just another kit picked from a catalog and Icarus enabled us to provide what I think is great looking original kit. The red and white hoops are a great classic look that really stands out and the draw string collars are great touch that pulls in the look of the past. I could be wrong but I believe we're the only domestic club who offers a draw string collar top, I think that alone would make Sam Mark smile, a man known for always looking for an angle to be best or standout among the others. I also opted to not place a sponsor on our kits to ensure it held that vintage feeling to it but added some patches on each sleeve and on the back to give it a piece of modern flair as well.

Our away kits, we'll be releasing those extremely soon. I wanted a modern look for away kit that drew attention to the power and respect that lays within the city of Fall River. There's a subtle brick design that is over the entire top and shorts, these symbolize the many factories that line our town as well as the tough resilience of the community, past & present. The red slash going through our top represents that we can't be divided and the slash moving in nontraditional style from the right to the left was done to ensure the club crest stands alone. These kits will also not have a sponsor on the front to ensure both our kits have a traditional look and honor our past. I'm really excited for these kits to drop, I think they are going to really turn some heads. As a kit nerd, to be able to produce two kits you designed is a pretty special feeling. All in all, Robert w/Icarus was an absolute dream to work with, from all angles, he brought our visions to life and the quality of the kits are simply amazing as well, you're honestly taking the foolish route if you're not getting yourself a proper kit from Icarus.

Where is the club at currently in the process of rebuilding?

We are getting ourselves ready to play league football this up and coming spring, 2020. We held tryouts in the middle of the summer to find ourselves a base of players to work with, along with the hopes of not disrupting the rosters of any of the other regional teams. We've played a few friendly matches so far and have a few others lined up for the fall and early spring. Some of our players are now currently playing college soccer and the remaining group of our players are playing two to three times per week in a local 7v7 indoor league. We believe that playing week in and out is going to really help everyone get comfortable with each other and give us an extra boost to our maiden voyage into league football come spring time.

We're also still exploring our possibilities for a home pitch and hope to have an announcement in the winter time as to where we will call home. We want to play in Fall River but the lack of playing fields as well as the club's history of calling Tiverton, Rhode Island home, has us exploring a few options. We also may play a match or two in Providence as we're looking to host a friendly match or two that may require a seating capacity more geared for a large stadium.

Lastly, I've been very fortunate with having some really positive discussions w/clubs outside of America. I want our club to have affiliations based across the globe so that we can offer our players a literal path to world of professional football, as well as one day bringing in players from these respective affiliates. Not only do I want our players to have the chance to play the game at the highest levels but also learn the game as well. Not enough clubs offer their players a chance to a have an actual life in football and I want to ensure ours is one of those clubs. The reality of the matter is that most players probably won't earn a large pay check to play football week in and out & have a playing career that will set themselves up for life...but many, many players can remain involved with the game at a coaching or front office position and this is something we want to help our players with. I want our affiliates to not only offer the chance of playing time but also offering a path into the business side of football, an aspect that if taken seriously, can become a lifetime career in the sport we love. I want our players who love this sport and are seeking a life in it to have the opportunities to stay within the sport, so I want to ensure our guys are leaving prepared to take on the footballing world, no matter what side of the touchline they are on.

What league will the club play in?

This aspect of our operations is very exciting but also very serious for ourselves. We will be the first club to openly take on promotion and relegation in America. We will look to start at the bottom of the American pyramid and work our way up via sporting merit. I'm unequivocally against the current structure of US club soccer and will look to use our club's journey up & down the ladder using FIFA's accepted policy (Article 9) of sporting merit to determine promotion & relegation. The process as it stands now with most domestic lower leagues would allow for us to move and up, albeit with a lot of legalese and money involved but we believe starting off the right way will allow us to grow the club responsibly... we also believe that Sam Mark our founder, an always vocal advocate for fair treatment by the leagues, would approve of us taking this route and helping to bring to light the issues that lay within U.S. club soccer. We'll be bringing this side of the club to the forefront very soon and we look forward to helping liberate US club soccer from the perennial pitfalls that have laid within it for far, far too long.

I've spoken with a few leagues in regards to the Marksmen joining them, including one or two new regional leagues which are set to take off in 2020 (not NISA). I'm pleased to say that a few of the leagues have been receptive to our approach and we're not closing any doors just yet but there is one league and path for the club that seems to fit our blue prints pretty well and I look forward to announcing our official league affiliation in the coming month or two.

Anything else we should know about the club?

Here's your fair warning .... the American Menace is back.