By Chris Wright
It all started with a Tweet. Back on February 11th, disgruntled Leyton Orient fan Craig Delew contacted the club’s chief executive, Matt Porter, vowing that he would personally “clean the dust off every seat in the East Stand” at Brisbane Road if the club went out and re-signed former Orient ‘keeper (and fan favourite) Eldin Jakupovic back on loan from Hull City.
Lo and behold, two days later Jakupovic returned to Orient from Hull on a season-long loan deal, with Porter jokingly Tweeting shortly thereafter: “Like all good clubs, we decide our transfer policy based on what our fans tweet,” in direct reference to Delew’s plea.
Orient then invited young Craig to make good on his promise, inviting the 19-year-old fan to come down to Brisbane Road and hand-clean all 3,600+ of the seats in the East Stand and, being a stand-up chap, Craig duly obliged – turning up at the ground on a chilly February morning to keep up his end of the bargain.
Impressed by Delew’s commitment, Orient then rewarded him by making him their VIP guest for the club’s game against Stevenage, allowing him to watch the match (Orient won 2-0) from the director’s box before organising a rather special face-to-face meeting with his hero Jakupovic after the final whistle…
.@CraigDelew star of #CleanForEldin & our guest tonight meeting Eldin who has promised Craig his gloves #LOFC pic.twitter.com/VtZ9SqJXmA
— Leyton Orient (@leytonorientfc) February 18, 2014
I have the gloves of a legend. Absolute pleasure meeting him and the lads! #lofc pic.twitter.com/snRkQTtoSH
— Craig Delew (@CraigDelew) February 18, 2014
Top stuff all round!