Sean Bechhofer

Why Blue?

Well, I noticed I got a name-check from an Everton fan in a recent issue of MCIVTA, so thought that it’s time to write my own “Why Blue” story and perhaps explain why I haven’t been seen on the net for a while.

Like many of MCIVTA’s readers I’m not a native Mancunian (I was born and bred in Edinburgh). However, I’m probably a little different, having discovered the joys of supporting City a little later in life than most. When I was a kid, I never went to games but took some interest in watching on the box. I went to University in Bristol and went to my first game there – Bristol City vs. Swindon in one of the fierce South-West derby games. The game itself was pretty dreadful stuff, and this was in 1987 when there still seemed to be a fair amount of trouble. The match was followed by running battles in the park next to Ashton Gate. I can’t say I was highly impressed with this introduction to live football.

After that, I came up to Manchester in 1988 to do some post-graduate work at the University. I was living on Lloyd Street South, the next street along from Maine Road, about fifty yards from the Main Stand. I’d watched the crowds assembling on a Saturday afternoon and one day, at a loose end, I went along and sat in the North Stand to see what it was like.

It was a chilly December afternoon and City stuffed Bradford 4-1. They were playing what I’d call “real” football – wingers out wide attacking the full-backs, some good crossing, and goals! It was also at the tail end of the inflatables craze and I really enjoyed the atmosphere in the ground. This was more like it! After that I was hooked. I watched a few games in the North and Main Stands, then got myself a membership card and stood on the Kippax. That was where I really began to enjoy myself. I didn’t make that many games that season but I can remember sitting in my back yard in the sun listening to the radio the day that City gained promotion.

During the 89-90 season, I discovered rec.sport.soccer on the net. I think it was still in its early days then (some veteran please correct me if I’m wrong), and was a great forum for discussion and some good-natured banter. I started posting snippets of news, gleaned from the local press, and then decided to brave a couple of match reports. The response was amazing – Blues from all over the world mailed to ask questions about how City were getting on. I also heard from a couple of local fans (Martin Ford and James Nash), and we started up our own small mailing list, swapping rumours and opinions about what was going on at the Academy. We’d meet up occasionally for a drink before the game, at first in the Clarence on Wilmslow Road, but latterly in the Welcome on Dickenson Road – a pub I’d recommend for a pre-game swill. I’d moved away from Rusholme then, but was more than happy to trek across town to see the Blues. We were joined on our little forum by John Pearson, one of our Californian exiles, and I had the pleasure of meeting up with him during a conference trip over there. If that’s not the “global village” in action, I don’t know what is!

While this was going on, City continued in their own, inimitable fashion. I suppose supporting Scotland through those seventies World Cup campaigns was good training for the time I’d spend at Maine Road. I could never understand it as a kid – a collection of some great individual players, but put the dark blue shirt on them and they couldn’t catch a bus! As an adult at Maine Road, I began to see what it was all about – football was not a game to be enjoyed, but suffered. Nick Hornby writes about this superbly in Fever Pitch, so I’m not going to try, but one of the things I enjoyed about Maine Road was the attitude of the fans – always prepared to have a joke (usually at their own expense), and being stoically resigned to the yo-yoing form of the Blues. One week they would play superbly, the next week a dire 1-0 loss.

I was certainly hooked, and took up a season ticket in the Kippax during the 91-92 season. Sixty-five quid it cost me (a point I’ll come back to later). I was also getting more adventurous with the match reports and tried to post something from most of the home games I went to (I didn’t go to away games). I think sometimes I imagined myself as some top sports reporter, hunched over a notebook in a camel hair overcoat, furiously scribbling my words of wit and wisdom. Not quite the true story perhaps!

For the next two years I kept up the season ticket and had some great times watching the Blues. From the many highs and lows, I’d certainly pick out the two 4-0 thrashings of Leeds. The first time round there was a real feeling that the fans wouldn’t mind if we didn’t win as Leeds were vying with United for the title. After the first went in, it looked like we were going to beat them and possibly help to hand it to the Rags. Once the goals kept on coming though, nobody minded – City were really playing and they didn’t care. Then when it happened the next year (after much talk in the pub about “remember last year?”) well, that was almost too much!

Another moment was a game against Blackburn in, I think, the 92-93 season. A couple of terrible defensive mistakes gave Blackburn a two goal lead after fourteen minutes but there was an incredible feeling of confidence in the crowd. Sure enough, City came back and ran out 3-2 winners. That feeling of utter confidence was hardly ever present at Maine Road but for some reason we were all sure what was going to happen. In many ways, I think that’s part of the attraction for me of live football. As you watch someone belt up the wing and stick in a great cross to the far post, for the next five seconds or so, you and the other twenty-odd thousand around you can tell the future. You can see what’s going to happen, and you know that the ball’s going to end up in the back of the net. The feeling is there sometimes when watching on the box, but it’s no comparison really.

The low point is I think obvious. The FA Cup débâcle against Spurs. I’d seen very little evidence of the kind of behaviour that had put me off on that first visit to Ashton Gate but then suddenly it was all happening in front of me. I suppose it was partly understandable – many years of frustration and a fairly inept display by City, but it was very sad to see. Just a couple of hours earlier we’d been sitting in the Welcome, with Spurs and Blues fans happily drinking together, then all this. I’d have been disappointed with the defeat in itself, but all the trouble put it in perspective.

To return to the highs, the top match for me was the famous victory against those titans of the football league, Derby County! Near the end of the season and a win would put Derby down. Quinn scored early on, and then after Coton was sent off for a challenge against Saunders, he stepped into the goal and pulled on the green jersey to face the penalty. A friend’s sister had come up from Derby for the match, and her face was a picture as Quinn dived low to his left to tip the Welshman’s attempt past the post. The Kippax erupted, and after that moment, Quinn was the hero. From the resulting corner, he came fifteen yards off his line and took the ball, knocking the County front line flying in the process. City scored a second through David White in the second half, and Niall only slightly blotted his copybook when the defence let him down and allowed Derby a late goal. Certainly an afternoon I’ll remember, although the evening is a little hazy!

Quinn has always been one of my favourites at Maine Road, and not just for that penalty save. He’s always seemed to be a model professional, loyal to the club and honest about his own performances. If City had a few more like him I think they wouldn’t do badly. The only problem with him I felt was that once City had their backs to the wall, too soon they’d revert to the long ball up to Quinn. How many times have we seen him trudge back up the park after chasing a lost cause?

I’m afraid this story has a rather sad ending though as regards my going to Maine Road. Some time ago when the suggestion of all-seater stadia was mooted, I proclaimed that I’d stop going. After trying the North and Main stands a few times, I’d decided I was definitely a standing fan. Admittedly, being six and half foot tall helps in being able to see, but one of the reasons I really enjoyed live football was the crowd atmosphere, which I felt was lacking in the seats. So when it finally happened, after much agonising, I decided that I wasn’t going to renew my season ticket for the 94-95 season. It’s not just the seats – I think that over the last couple of years, the treatment of football fans by the football authorities has been poor, with very little consultation of us, the “customers”. Not to mention the price. That first season ticket cost me 65 quid. The next year it was 85, and after that 135 (although that was admittedly not the cheapest one could have paid). That’s not quite in step with inflation I think. The Premier League – a whole new ball game? Hmmmm. Don’t get me started on that one. Some may accuse me of being a “fair-weather” fan, although given City’s performance over the brief period I was watching them, I think an “overcast with probable showers” fan would be a more apt description! I suppose I’m lucky in that having only spent a few years on the terrace, I was able to make that decision. I’m sure that for many, it’s simply impossible, and it’s the loyalty of those supporters that the clubs are, in my opinion, abusing.

I did make a couple of games this season. I went with a friend (not my choice, honest!) to Blackburn to see Rovers trouncing Ipswich, and saw the 0-0 draw with Newcastle at Maine Road. The first game was strange. We sat high up in the Main Stand, and yes the view was great but there was very little atmosphere. At first I though it was perhaps because it was Ewood Park, but then at Maine Road it was the same. Quiet and subdued, and even though in my day I’ve been known to offer a little “encouragement” and suggestion to the players on the park, I really didn’t feel into it. Someone offered the comment that it was like Newcastle were at home. Maybe that’s the way it’s going. As the game becomes more and more geared to corporate hospitality and top class entertainment with great facilities, the home fans will become less vocal. Meanwhile, the travelling fans are still the die-hards, who’ll sing their hearts out all afternoon. A couple of seasons ago, a friend came along to one of the aforementioned Leeds games. The last time she’d been to a game was Elland Road many years before, and she remarked that compared to that, there didn’t seem to be much singing or crowd reaction going on. I know that many things on the terrace were not good in those days, but I wonder what she’d make of it now…?

I’d still count myself as a City fan though, and keep an interest in how the team are doing, mainly now through the mailing list and listening to the radio on a Saturday afternoon. It’s not been a great season, although there’s definitely the nucleus of a good side there. I was well impressed by Rösler when he arrived at the end of last season and he’s continued to show good form. Like Quinn, he seems to have his heart in the right place and a respect for the fans. I was a little sorry to see Horton go. Although not the best manager in the world, he had made some reasonable buys and has never really been given much to play with in financial terms. After all the to-ing and fro-ing of the Swales years, some continuity is needed now. Let’s hope that we get it and next season is one to remember.

First printed in: MCIVTA Newsletter #91 on