Kolin Ibhraim

Why Blue?

Manchester City. whatta team. I’ve decided to contribute some way in trying to describe how I ended up probably being the only Bruneian supporting the Blues. Well, I was born and raised in Brunei which is a tiny oil-rich country on the north-west coast of Borneo, perhaps mostly famed for the wealth of its Sultan, allegedly the richest man in the world. My father is Bruneian and my mother Mancunian. They met whilst he was studying in Salford. We made regular trips to England to visit my mother’s family which is where I got tied in with the Blues. My grandfather and my mum’s brother were die-hard Blues then and they used to take me to a few games. Back then however I had no idea what my first game was but it was apparently when I was 3 or 4 sometime over Christmas. My grandad has passed away since and my uncle has disappeared in Spain. I still remember most of the stories my grandad used to tell me, as he used to attend the games throughout City’s “golden-era”.

Anyway, I finally came to live in England when I was fifteen, met some kids and started watching City week in week out. As most of these games are relatively recent they’re not that impressive, but the first one of them I went to was the 2-0 over Norwich at home. I watched most of the games in the 94/95 season and I suppose the one that really stood out was the 3-2 over Blackburn where Filtcroft played a blinder. Despite our struggles it was an electric season for me being part of the atmosphere, especially at away games. Beating Newcastle at St. James’ was super as we were standing in terraces and I guess the one thing City fans have is this natural sense of pride of where there from and get a lot of respect from a lot of clubs for turning out in force the way they do. Alas, I’ve since had to move down to London where I’m doing a degree yet catch all the games I can including that cup-tie against the Rags.

It’d be great if the Sultan threw something City’s way, but he doesn’t like football. His son however is a big fan and I’ve met Kev Keegan.

First printed in: MCIVTA Newsletter #288 on