How one night saved Orange from having a footy team called the Seals

Golf is every Wednesday and footy, well the footy has been every Sunday for about the last 50 years.

But there’s one topic of conversation the duo seems to stumble on – and it’s a slippery one.

The Orange Seals. Yep, seals.

Before Orange Hawks, the club was Orange Ex-Services and, for a time, had a Seal as its mascot.

“I don’t know why. It was stupid … how’d we let that get through,” Gentles laughs.

“I don’t know,” Kent smiled. “There’s no ocean here.”

No ocean and potentially no more club, either.

In the early 1980s, things changed, and they changed quickly: the Ex-Services club pulled its sponsorship from the rugby league club and left the likes of Kent and Gentles looking for answers.

They had just one night to find those answers too.

With nominations for the 1981 Group 10 season set to close the next day, Gentles and Kent met with a host of Ex-Services’ old boys to save the club, decide on new colours and, importantly, vote on a new moniker – anything but a seal.

“We were talking about Eagles and different birds. We came up with Hawks, no one had that around here,” Kent said.

And the colours? The two blues? Kent smiles.

“Back then it was cheaper to go with colours that were the same as Sydney clubs, so we went with the Sharks’ colours,” the devout Cronulla fan said.

“How’d we let him get away with that,” Gentles laughs. “Fair dinkum … I still wanted the Parramatta colours.”

“I would have stuck with those,” Kent adds quickly.

“But back then, being young blokes, we were told by the Ex-Services club we had to change colours, we couldn’t have blue and gold.

“At that stage we didn’t know you couldn’t own colours. No one owns colours.”

And so, amid the flurry of name changes, colour switches and team nominations, Orange Hawks was born.

This weekend the Hawks club will pay homage to its Ex-Services beginnings when the Group 10 competition leaders host Cowra in a top-of-the-table clash at Wade Park on Saturday.

Willie Heta’s premier league side will don retro jumpers, emblazoned in the blue and gold colours close to both Gentles and Kent.

The duo was part of premiership winning sides in reserve grade in 1969, 1973, 1974 and 1977, while the then blue and golds went down to the all-conquering Oberon Tigers in the ‘69 first grade decider as well.

Anyone part of the Ex-Services club throughout the 60s and 70s is encouraged to come to Wade Park for the old boys’ day – Kent and Gentles can’t wait.

“It’s great, they were the best times of our lives,” Gentles said.

“It’s good to see them doing well now,” Kent added.

“They want to bring the old club back into it as a stepping stone, a bit of a bridge.

“They’ll keep the club on the rise and keep people involved, and that’s important. It’s a big thing.”

League tag kicks off old boys day against Cowra from 11am. Premier league is scheduled to start at 3pm.