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Your support makes all the difference.There is an assumption that what is about to happen is usually important when there is an announcement about an announcement.
Imagine there had been some rumblings about a political sacking, only for Downing Street to issue a press release stating there would be an announcement the next day. What fills the gap is excited chatter and for those involved in political journalism - the men and women who stalk the hallways of Parliament - a cascade of phonecalls and text messages trying to get the bottom of what is about to happen before anyone else can.
But when Usain Bolt announced on Monday that there will be an announcement, there deserves to be none of that.
The Jamaican is famous around the world now for his athletics career in which he broke a number of records and won fistfuls of medals while simultaneously building up a lovable lothario persona - think Russell Brand in yellow spandex - and picking up some valuable commercial deals. But Bolt announcing on Monday that he'd signed for a football club, and that he would reveal which one it was on Tuesday, doesn't really get people talking in the same way. It is the same formula of the big build-up but without the key thing that usually accompanies hype - interest.
“I’ve signed for a football team! Find out which one this Tuesday at 8am GMT," he says.
But has he?
Well, contractually there's no doubt he's probably signed on the dotted line with an institution best-known for being a football club but what excitement does Usain Bolt offer anyone around a football club that isn't a marketing director or content creator? Fans of any major club signing a 31-year-old player from abroad with no football experience might not exactly be filled with excitement, which is the essence of what is important here.
Transfers are a source of interest among football fans because they offer hope, the hope that your team might suddenly blow a club-record fee on a superstar forward or, even better, buy someone you've never heard of in exchange for some training cones who then turns out to be a club legend.
It is the same reason that American football fans get carried away around the NFL draft, because the promise of what the best players in college football could bring to your favourite team invariably outweighs the reality of what occurs. Some teams will delight their support and make bold moves. Others will do little and face the ire of their fans.
In both eventualities and in both of these scenarios - football transfers or drafting players in American sports - the idea that a potential saviour is around the corner is something that will never die because the love of sport breeds optimism. The love of a team breeds extreme emotions, the love you felt when you first saw them play, perhaps, but also the hatred that burnt strong when your childhood hero walked out on the club for a bigger pay cheque.
The fanbase of whichever team Bolt 'signs' for will experience none of these extreme feelings, they will likely cringe at the inevitably contrived publicity stunt to follow.
Unlike those parliamentary journalists referenced earlier on, no sports journalist is going to be jamming the phone lines in pursuit of the Bolt story. Such is his value now as an almost purely commercial entity that you can safely predict his 'club' (read: host for upcoming sponsor events) will be one whose technical partner is Puma, with whom Bolt has a mega-deal estimated at around $8m per year.
Bolt's transformation from athlete to commercial property was complete before his retirement in a way that was probably only matched by David Beckham and Michael Jordan before him. Obviously the next wave of significant sports retirements will change that but Bolt was a leading light for athletics who realised his value greater than anyone else in his generation or field. Within athletics there were meetings that would pay him six-figure deals (verging on seven-figure deals) just to get him to come and compete. His endorsements are comparable with the likes of Roger Federer but the disproportionate wealth Bolt enjoyed compared to his fellow track and field athletes is probably unrivalled - more even than Tiger Woods, who at this peak took home around $125m a year and three times more than his nearest competitor.
Whatever Bolt announces tomorrow is almost certainly going to be glitzy, lucrative and noisy but it is going to be a publicity stunt, not sport. Like David Ginola's run at the Fifa presidency or Rio Ferdinand's attempt at boxing - both heavily backed by bookmakers as sponsors - there is little genuine intrigue, just another chance for a photo shoot and a quick buck before we all move on with our day.
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