Usain Bolt might be an eight-time Olympic champion but he isn’t football-fit, according to his coach at A-League club Central Coast Mariners.
Browsing: Usain Bolt
Olympic sprint champion, Usain Bolt, came off the bench to commence his football career with Australia’s Central Coast Mariners in a pre-season friendly at Gosford on Friday.
The Jamaican is likely to be handed a 10 or 15 minute run-out for Australia’s Central Coast Mariners in a friendly against an amateur side as he works towards his dream of earning a playing contract and becoming a professional footballer.
Usain Bolt has admitted that he is keen to “prove people wrong” as he looks to earn a contract at Central Coast Mariners.
Olympic sprint champion Usain Bolt will train with Australia’s Central Coast Mariners as he continues his quest to become a professional football player.
The 31-year-old Jamaican, who retired from athletics after winning eight Olympic gold medals, is a soccer fanatic and trained with the club in Drammen, some 40km south-west of Oslo, earlier on Wednesday.
The Jamaican sprinting legend spent two days with the Bundesliga club last month, scoring a fine header and pulling off a silky nutmeg, although head coach Peter Stoger suggested he was not ready for top level football.
Blake had been widely tipped to top the podium on the Gold Coast, with many going as far as to proclaim him the heir-apparent to retired compatriot Usain Bolt as the king of sprint.
The Jamaican is chasing one of the 33 golds up for grabs on day four of the Gold Coast Games.
On Friday, Bolt spent time at the facilities of the Bundesliga side as he continues to consider trying to become a professional footballer after his retirement from athletics.
Bolt, an eight-time Olympic gold medallist and world-record holder in the 100 metres, trained behind closed doors on Thursday, and United States international Christian Pulisic told ESPN FC he had been delighted to work with the 31-year-old.
The Bundesliga club says the eight-time Olympic champion, whose last race before retirement was at the 2017 world championships, will “participate in an open training session” with coach Peter Stoeger’s side.
Bolt, 31, who retired from athletics after August’s World Championships in London, has been busy preparing for a tilt at football and has also worked with Australia’s cricketers to boost their running between the wickets.
Bolt’s side with take on Robbie Williams’ England team in the charity football match at Old Trafford in June.
Soccer Aid for Unicef is the original England v Soccer Aid World XI charity game.
“Never did I feel that I would be in this moment, as big as it is now, among statues at the National Stadium where it all began,” said Bolt, winner of six individual Olympic gold medals and seven individual world titles.
The 31-year-old, an eight-time Olympic champion, retired from athletics after the London World Championships in August when his 100m farewell ended in a third-placed finish behind Gatlin and Christian Coleman.
The 31-year-old eight-time Olympic gold medalist, currently recovering from a hamstring injury, accepted there might be some skepticism, but said it had always been his boyhood dream.
The eight-time Olympic champion, who retired from athletics following the London 2017 World Athletics Championships, is also set to be driven around the Circuit of the Americas by championship leader Lewis Hamilton in the build-up to the Grand Prix.
The only sprinter to capture the 100- and 200-meter track titles at three consecutive Olympics, Bolt retired after this year’s world championships in London. He holds the world record of 9.58 seconds in the 100 and 19.19 in the 200
The world’s fastest man brought his glittering career to an end in London at the World Championships and he is now set to embark on a new venture.