Bolt’s first Mariners outing a big deal

FOOTBALL USAIN Bolt is set to headline a ‘Big Bash’ style extravaganza at Central Coast Stadium on Friday night — on the proviso it doesn’t impact his push for a $3 million A-League contract.

As Bolt prepares to make his Australian football debut, the Mariners are putting the final touches to a blockbuster event involving fireworks, dancers, a Bolt Bay, live DJ, Mariners cannon, $50 family tickets, and distribution of some 100,000 Bolt masks across the Coast.

Mariners players will take on a team of the Coast’s strongest park footballers. If everything goes as expected in training this week, the world’s fastest man will play up to 15 minutes, likely at left wing.

Normally, this match would be played on the club’s training ground at Lisarow.

Yet thanks to the Bolt Effect, the trial has shifted to the 20,000-seat Central Coast Stadium, with Fox Sports broadcasting live and Football Federation Australia looking to sell the feed globally.

Bolt has already generated more interest for the A-League than Juventus legend Alessandro Del Piero did in 2012.

“So this isn’t simply a game, it’s an event,” Mariners CEO Shaun Mielekamp said. We’re expecting an atmosphere similar to that of a Big Bash game.

“I know there’s football traditionalists out there who don’t like it. But it was exactly the same when Twenty20 cricket arrived.

“But that’s exactly the sort of space we’re wanting to play in with this. “Usain Bolt’s journey is a wonderful one … and now we want to bring people along on that ride.”