Colin Kazim-Richards: ‘A lot of my cousins and friends are in jail or dead’
“What journeyman has won what I’ve won? What journeyman has played at the clubs that I’ve played at?”
Colin Kazim-Richards has a point. He is not a journeyman, he is simply too good to be put in that bracket; his CV is far too rich. He is, however, a man on a journey. After six months at Coritiba in Brazil at the end of last year, he recently made the switch across the country to Corinthians in São Paulo. It is his 13th club in as many years, across seven different countries.
Rejected by Arsenal at the age of 15, Kazim-Richards headed north to make it as a professional at Bury and, after three years in England, moved to Fenerbahce in 2007. He was the first player to cross the Fener/Galatasaray divide and has won league titles in Turkey, Greece and Scotland. He reached the semi-finals of Euro 2008 and has 37 caps and two goals for Turkey.
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And he is far from finished. At 30, he is at one of the biggest clubs in the world (at least when it comes to the fanbase) and seems, whisper it, settled in Brazil. His wife, Mariana, is from São Paulo and he considers his children, Caio and Taliyah-Belle, who are six and four respectively, to be Brazilian.
So what is it that has driven Kazim, as they call him here, to all corners of the world? It would seem that the boy from Leyton in east London is either running from something or searching for something, but that is not how he sees it. “The moves are who I am,” he says when we meet at Corinthians’ training ground. “I’m not afraid of taking a chance on myself. If I was I could not have left home when I did.
“If you look at it from a psychologist’s point of view, I could understand that point of view but for me, I’ve used football as a tool to see the world and people should respect that. People should applaud what I’ve done but instead they are trying to call me a journeyman.”
So what is it? Does he have itchy feet? “I am not at one club looking at my next. But in life, and especially football, I have always had to be prepared not only to move forward but also sideways and even backwards.”
From someone who comes where I come from, to have seen and done what I have, is a fantasy
His 58 goals in some 390 competitive club appearances is hardly the stuff of legend for a forward but, as he points out, football is not just about putting the ball in the net. It is as much about overcoming obstacles and working hard. “Look, I am a mixed-race, West Indian Turk from east London. I speak three languages, I’ve won three league titles, three Super Cups and have a bronze medal from the Euros. For someone who comes from where I come from, to have seen and done what I have, is a fantasy.”
In sports journalism, however, players are often reduced to caricatures and Kazim-Richards has been placed in the “bad boy” and the “journeyman” categories. Sitting with him after training, however, he is charming, thoughtful and engaging.
Swaggering out of the changing rooms and into the boiling Brazilian sunshine for a couple of hours’ training, he greets everyone warmly, kisses the team’s press officer good morning as he passes, speaking Portuguese almost without an accent.
Kazim-Richards now finds himself at a struggling club trying to rebuild. Photograph: Fernando Martinho/The Guardian
The first thing you notice is the size of the man. He is easily the biggest player in the squad, the dark blue Corinthians training top clinging tightly to him whereas it rather hangs off some of the others. He is built more like a rugby player these days and looks like an action hero.
There is more to Kazim-Richards than just muscles, though. In fact, there seem to be two Colin Kazim-Richards’s. First there is the warrior we see on the pitch. “I’m ‘ride or die’ for my team whoever or wherever they are. If you’re messing with my guy on the pitch, I’m taking charge of that. If you’re trying to bully someone, I’m taking charge of that. What needs to be said to the coach, OK, I’ll say it. And that’s been my downfall. That’s what happens when you’re a general, innit, hahaha.”
Then there is the man we do not see too often: the worrier. “I don’t sleep after games. I go over and over everything. I could fall asleep at 7am and then wake up at 8am with my kids.” This is a man who sees what is going on around him and quietly offers help; someone who always has food and water in his car to give to those less fortunate. In Brazil, there is no escaping the poverty. “Sometimes it makes you upset, like it makes you feel selfish: ‘Should I really be enjoying my day?’”
I respect England. They didn't give my mum and dad anything but they gave us … a platform
To try to fully understand this “one-off” player and his unorthodox trajectory, however, we need to go right back to the start. His Turkish-Cypriot, Muslim mother was evacuated from the Mediterranean island by the British army after a military coup in 1974. His father is a Rastafarian, born to Antiguan Christian parents, and used to get attacked just for stepping out with her. “I’d say from round about 1983 you start seeing mixed-race babies [in London]. It wasn’t the norm. So my mum and dad had all that. My dad, especially, had skinheads beating him up, going to wars with them in Walthamstow.”
Kaz, as he is known to his friends back home, is as London as they come but has always felt Turkish, attended Turkish school as a child and spoke the language at home with his mum and “nene” (grandma).
Asked whether he feels English at all, Kazim-Richards hesitates before giving his answer, knowing full well that his responses can, and do, get taken the wrong way. He confirms that he never had dreams of playing for England and if he does have roots anywhere, they’re not in his country of birth.
“My blood is not English, if you know what I’m saying? Growing up it was Caribbean in my house and it was Turkish. I never ate fish and chips growing up, my mum cooked Turkish food and West Indian food. For a family, we’re so far away from [being] English.
“I respect England. They didn’t give my mum and dad anything but they gave us … a platform. And then it was down to my mum and dad and all our families to be able to try and make something out of it. Which 95% of us have failed to do. I’m lucky, my dad and my mum had more perseverance with me and I was able to make something of my life but a lot of my cousins and a lot of friends are in jail or dead.”
After being rejected by Arsenal, Kazim-Richards made what he says was the most difficult move of his life. “I’m from London and I moved to Bury – that’s been the hardest move ever, culturally. There were no black people up there and food was hard for me. All that rolled into one. And then you go into training and people think it’s funny to put bananas on your peg and then people think it’s funny to cut up your shoes but what people don’t realise is my dad don’t have money.
“I was on £45 a week – I can’t buy new shoes every week. Cutting up your laces and putting a hole in your crotch on your trousers and shit like that. They don’t understand how hard my dad works … I used to clean my trainers with a toothbrush.”
Would he describe that as “football banter” or racism? “The first time I think it’s more ignorance, but then it really is racism after that, because they’re not listening, they still think it’s funny. And then you retaliate and you get labelled a bad boy,” he says.
He has had to deal with racism all his life and appeared in court after making a “homophobic” gesture towards Brighton fans in 2013. He does not regret it. “I’ve got more racism in England for being Turkish than being black. That ‘homophobic’ thing all started from people calling me a Turkish kebab. ‘Go back to Turkey, you fucking Turkish kebab!’ People have quoted that I’ve got charged with homophobia but I didn’t, I got charged with public disorder.”
If someone else did it with a different name, different colour skin, they'd be like: 'Look! England's not the only way'
Kazim-Richards does not see any difference between what he did and what the Brighton fans were doing to him and he feels the colour of his skin has made it easier for people to label him a bad boy. “I think if I was a different colour, my career would be held up as an example rather than ‘ah, he’s a journeyman’, because I don’t suit the label.
“I’ve played for some of the biggest teams in the world, I’m here now playing for one of the biggest teams in the world. And I just think if someone else did it, with a different name, different colour skin, they’d be, like: ‘Look, you see! England’s not the only way.’”
Kazim-Richards feels a lot of players are judged differently because of their race and because of where they come from. “Look at Raheem [Sterling] and [Paul] Pogba, for example, when they don’t have a good game everybody comes down on them for like, crazy stuff. Crazy stuff. And then you look at other players …” He trails off, letting the silence hang in the air. “Everyone’s quiet. I’m not gonna say the names. Nobody has the same talks. Like I see a piece in the paper about Raheem in the pound shop and people are taking the piss like: ‘Woah! He’s earning this amount.’ What? He can’t shop at the pound shop?”
In Turkey he says he never had a problem being accepted “because they saw it as I picked Turkey over England. Which I did at that time.” Pulling on the national colours of Turkey are his fondest on-pitch memories to date. His voice softens. “When I played for the national team the people loved me, bro. Loved me. And that’s one thing that I love about it – it’s a different kind of love. It makes you cry, playing for a nation like that.”
Kazim-Richards scores for Blackburn Rovers against his boyhood club, Arsenal, February 2013. Photograph: Kerim Okten/EPA
More outspoken on political issues than most players on his Twitter feed, he often posts messages about what is happening in Turkey. Last year, after scoring the decider for Coritiba in a local derby, he screamed, “Fuck terrorism! I love Turkey!” down the camera lens and posted the video on Twitter with the message ‘together we are stronger’.
“These are kids that are getting blown up,” he says. “In Turkey you don’t have a choice about joining the military; my cousins have done it. My friend’s dad got blown up on the bus. Umut Bulut, I played with him at Galatasaray and the national team … His dad got blown up in Ankara on the bus. And he’s one of the nicest guys I’ve ever met. That shit is painful.”
A product of the English system, Kazim-Richards now occupies a place well outside it, having returned only once in the past 10 years for a season’s loan at Blackburn. Why don’t more English players travel then? “They’re comfy. It’s not portrayed in the media, ‘You can do this, you can go there’. Everything is England, England, England. I’ve seen guys that got released from Manchester United and rather than even going down to London to a League One or Championship side they’re staying in Manchester playing amateur football.”
He complains that English football is too closed and suffers from “nepotism, jobs for the boys, prejudice and the belief that only those in control are correct”. Kazim-Richards believes that the system is not built for guys such as him to succeed. “If you look like me and beg to differ you are ostracised.”
We'll always have a home here, one million per cent
To try to address this perceived imbalance, he now invests heavily in a youth team, Kazim Richards Academy, in London. He likes to be there, when he can, to offer advice and guidance, something he said he missed growing up. “When I go and talk to the kids, I tell them, you can do anything you wanna do wherever you wanna do it.”
Even in football, one of the great levellers, Kazim-Richards feels that diversity is discouraged. “In England the last thing they judge you on is your football ability and the first thing they judge you on is: ‘Look what he’s got on today, look at that line in his hair.’ Bro, that’s where I’m from, you see?”
He now finds himself at a struggling team, trying to rebuild itself, and is getting used to the topsy-turvy world of Brazilian football. Corinthians were Brazilian champions in 2015 but then lost their manager, Tite, to the national squad and have not been the same since. Fans and staff at the club have clearly warmed to him and he has been given the moniker of “Gringo da favela”. Corinthians are known in São Paulo as the team of the marginalised. Enter any favela in the city and Corinthians shirts easily outnumber those of their local rivals, São Paulo, Palmeiras and Santos. “I tried to explain to them that, OK, I’m not from your favela, we don’t have favelas, but I’m from an area that has the same injustices and the same kind of politics.”
‘A lot of teams get tired of that and I can see that Corinthians won’t – they like that – so it’s kind of like I’ve found my home.’ Photograph: Fernando Martinho/The Guardian
Having already worked himself into the starting lineup as the lone striker (ahead of the former Manchester City player Jô) Kazim-Richards received a standing ovation from the crowd as he was substituted after 80 bruising minutes against their bitter rivals Palmeiras last week. He may have lost a yard or two of pace but you can never question his commitment. The fans cheered loudly as he flicked the ball over Felipe Melo’s head in the second half: “Kazim! Kazim! Kazim!” Corinthians fans often prize determination over skill and expect nothing less than blood, sweat and tears. “Training is a match and a match is war,” as the ultras here like to say.
“A lot of teams get tired of that and I can see that Corinthians won’t – they like that – so it’s kind of like I’ve found my home.”
So will he and his Brazilian family finally settle here? Can he see himself retiring in Brazil? “If it was me, yeah. But I’ve gotta think about my kids, you know, schooling and further education. But we’ll always have a home here, one million per cent.”
Wherever he goes next, Kazim‑Richards does seem to have found peace and maybe a little of what he has been searching for all this time. “It’s educating, they teach me stuff every day about myself,” he says about his young children, “and about the world. It’s just made me have finally, some … What’s the word I’m looking for? Oh yes, unconditional love.”
Kazim-Richards during his 18-month spell at Feyenoord, who he left for Celtic. Photograph: Rex Shutterstock