Notable Cityzens - How Manchester City’s success on the pitch has inspired the growth of the official supporters club in Kerala

As part of an exclusive series, Goal in collaboration with Manchester City and TECNO are going behind the scenes to tell you about the role of the Manchester City Official Supporters Club in Kerala and what are some of their duties as an official fans club.

In this interview, we sit down with two founding members of the Man City Official Supporters Club in Kerala - Irfan Pottachola and Sreekanth PS.

Irfan, an avid follower of Man City, who is the founder of the Official Supporters Club in Kerala, touched upon the various community-benefit activities the group is involved in.

Getty Images

"The reason to start a Supporters Club was to grow as a fanbase. We already had a big community but we wanted to grow further. In the beginning, we were already a group of 50 people and were interested in doing something for the community.

“For example, We sponsored the Kovalam FC U13 football team and that happened even before we were an official Supporters Club. We wanted to scale that up and for that, we wanted to attract more people and for that, we needed an umbrella,” stated Irfan, explaining why they wanted the official recognition from the club.

He further suggested that the group never had to promote themselves to bring in new members as the brand of Manchester City has attracted fans.

"We don’t really promote ourselves,” claimed Irfan. “Without any promotion, we have seen people joining us. It is Manchester City’s success on the pitch that is helping us get more fans. New fans develop with every passing year. Like after the 100-point season in 2017-18, we saw a growth in our membership.”