Remember the Brazilian footballer Bebeto? At the World Cup he scored a goal against the Netherlands and celebrated in a manner that has been copied many times since. Bebeto shaped his arms into a cradle and began to make the sign of rocking his new-born baby. That baby, who became a footballer himself, is now 30 years old. I don’t remember the goal, but I remember the celebration!
Likewise with Cameroonian Roger Milla’s hip-swinging dance at the corner flag in celebration. Or Pat Cash’s leap into his player box after winning the 1987 Wimbledon. Bjorn Borg dropping to his knees after winning — the list goes on. The celebrations stay in the mind, the scores….well, there’s always Google!
More recently, the Usain Bolt celebration caught the world’s imagination. And my current favourite — Kevin Sinclair’s cartwheel-somersault combo (in pic) on taking a wicket for the West Indies against Australia. Cricket is more about sobriety than flippancy — the high five and the team hug apart — so we must treasure Sinclair’s effort!
How important is celebration in sport? The answer, of course, is that sport itself is a celebration — to deny this would be to misunderstand what it stands for. Celebrations can be intensely personal, familiar through repetition or even a commentary on a current event (although in this case, the athlete will need to tread a path between the acceptable and the punishable).
Non-celebration too can be as significant as celebration. When Germany beat Brazil 7-1 at the World Cup in Brazil in 2014, the celebrations became muted with every goal. German coach Joachim Loew said his team felt “no euphoria.” The Germans cut out all theatrics. Except for a raising of the arms there were no displays as the score mounted. After the game, one of the players said his team had decided they were not out to humiliate Brazil, adding, “You have to show your opponent respect….”
Some celebrations are carried out so regularly and so consistently that they become identified with the athlete concerned. Mo Farah’s ‘Mobot’ and Bolt’s ‘Lightning Bolt’ are good examples. Not surprisingly, both the long distance runner and the sprinter trademarked their celebration, as did the Welsh footballer Gareth Bale who did the same with his ‘Eleven of Hearts’ celebration, to be used as logos on clothing, footwear, headgear and whatever else their agents dreamed up.
The silhouette image of Seve Ballesteros winning the 1984 Open at St. Andrews is used for the Seve Foundation in support of cancer research.
Periodically, governing bodies in sports decide how players may or may not celebrate. This is because celebrations are not always innocent or spontaneous. FIFA introduced a rule some years ago that banned the use of slogans on the undershirts of players who celebrate by flicking their jerseys over their heads and attract TV cameras to the slogans underneath.
The best celebrations, like the best moves in sport, have about them originality, spontaneity, and even humour. And perhaps that most important aspect of a contest too: unexpectedness.
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