Heartlanders Who Cheer With Their Hearts

Three seats away from where I sat in the Jalan Besar Stadium Grandstand during the Singapore-Montenegro match for the Youth Olympic Games Boys Soccer Bronze medal was a group of teenage boys who cheered continuously for the home team.

It was a hot and humid night. The young man nearest to me waved a white T-shirt marked “B”, but it was not to cool himself. Each of the others also held papers in their hands; the fourth one down the line carried two. One needed to stand in front of the group to realise that together, they were forming a word. I moved to the centre of the group and asked one of them to give up his seat for me. Out of respect for an older woman with a commanding voice, everyone shifted down the line.

Suddenly, “B”, “R” “A”, “N”, “D”, “O”, “N”, was disrupted.

I took out my Blackberry and showed them a photograph image of a young Cub.

“Is this who you’re cheering for?” I asked.

“BRANDON! BRANDON! BRANDON!” one of the group started cheering and the rest joined in.

Suddenly, I was very welcome.

Galindo Goh explained: “Brandon and I live just a few blocks away from each other in Pasir Ris. His mum and my mum are from the Philippines. We have been friends since we were knee-high. When our mums met for chats, Brandon and I would be kicking a ball in the void deck. The rest of the group…”

“WE’RE BRANDON FANS!” shouted Muhd Rahmat Mohd Yusof.

Galindo, who’s currently studying Bioengineering at Singapore Polytechnic, continued: “When we first met, they were all from Yishun Town Secondary School and played soccer together. One day, I told them that I know this guy who plays very well, and they asked me to invite him to join them in a game.

“After the first kick-around, we became regular weekend soccer-kakis. Brandon and I would take a 40-minute bus ride from Paris Ris to meet the rest of the group in Yishun. We’d play soccer for an hour or two and then split up to go home.”

Farid Bidin said: “Then suddenly, at the beginning of this year, Brandon disappeared. We telephoned him and asked him why he didn’t come to play soccer with us anymore and he said he was busy. We even teased, ‘You training for YOG, ah?’ and he would laugh and say, ‘No, la. Not good enough. Just been busy.’

“Then when we read that he’s in the Singapore Team for the YOG, we understood his ‘disappearance’. Wah! We felt so proud of him! Our friend – in the Singapore Team going to play in the YOG!”

The six have attended all the YOG Soccer matches which featured the Singapore Cubs.
“We would all meet at an appointed time and line up together to get tickets. I’m officially broke!’ said Ajit Gopalkrishnan, who’s also studying Bioengineering at Singapore Polytechnic.

So does Brandon know that they’ve been around, cheering him on?

Muhammad Helmi Elias, from Temasek Polytechnic, said: “We don’t want to distract him. So, we haven’t called him at all.”

Galindo added: “We’re just doing what we want to do, support the Cubs and support our friend Brandon.”

Danial Yunus, from Yishun Junior College, said: “Imagine this: The next time we play soccer with Brandon, we would be playing with someone who has played in the YOG!”
Galindo said: “We wanted to sing ‘Majula Singapura’ with the whole stadium of supporters, but we didn’t make it to the Gold Medal match. But it’s OK, we can still sing it.”

And with that, the six teenage boys sang the Singapore National Anthem. And I joined in, as did many around us.

For the record, Singapore beat Montenegro 4-1 for the Bronze medal.