What have the following five great, past and present, footballers in common: Portugal's Eusebio, Argentine Diego Maradona, Frenchman Just Fontaine and Italians Gianni Rivera and Roberto Baggio? Apart from a not indifferent ability with the round ball, the answer is probably not a lot. These five did, however, come together last year in Monte Carlo to take their shoes off and leave their foot imprints on the wet cement of a sidewalk now called "Champions Boulevard".
In the week when Champions League semi-finalists Monaco could yet write a glorious, if unexpected page in French football history, it is curious to report that Monte Carlo has assigned itself the role of providing football's equivalent of the celebrated "Holywood Boulevard", the place where the paws of the movie industry's most famous stars are immortalised.
Curious, perhaps, but not surprising that Monte Carlo should find itself at the centre of a sports award promotion that involves media organisations from 18 countries, including Argentina, Japan and Uruguay as well as Eastern and Western European nations. If there is one thing the principality of Monaco is good at, it is the business of glitzy media hype.
You get some idea of the depth of glitz, if we report that the "Golden Foot" trophy awarded last year to the first winner - Baggio, by the way - consisted of a golden footprint weighing 200 grams, "completely hand-embossed and chiselled" rounded off with a golden star containing an 0.58 carat diamond inset. This was produced, we are informed, by the Monegasque jewellers Zegg and Cerlati, while among the award promoters are the bank Credit Suisse.
In the age of Global FootBiz, it seems, there is no shortage of agents, principalities, banks, media organisations and even jewellers willing to hitch their wagons to the football band.
Given that Italy's leading sports daily, Gazzetta Dello Sport, is involved, then a certain level of seriousness is attached to the "Golden Foot" initiative. The line-up for this year's award, for example, looks promising - Beckham, Crespo, Davids, Figo, Kahn, Maldini, Nedved, Romario, Ronaldo and Zidane. (The award is decided by fans from all over the world and any reader caring to vote can do so by visiting the website www.goldenfoot.com.)
In our churlish way, we are tempted to ask if football really needs another annual award. Or if it does, would it not be better to instigate a different type of award, say the "Good Husbandry" annuals given to the club or clubs that manage to finish the season with their books in the black, regardless of football results?
While chewing the bitter cud of these sour thoughts, however, one noticed that the World Champions Club, the organisers of the Golden Foot awards, also award money every year to football charities. Last year's award went to a charity run by the former Brazilian captain, Carlos Dunga, the man who led Brazil to the World Cup title at USA'94.
Dunga admits football offered him the chance to escape from poverty in his native city, Porto Alegre. Now 40 and out of football, Dunga has not forgotten his origins. Rather, he has set up the Restinga Olympic Village where, helped by the Rio Grande de Sul state government and by the YMCA, he offers help to kids from the favelas, the shanty towns on the outskirts of his city.
In theory, the kids, boys and girls, go to the Restinga Village for sports training. In reality, says Dunga, they go there in order to get something to eat. Where you might expect to find the former World Cup winner teaching the finer skills of midfield play, he and his team are in fact busy trying to teach eight-year-olds to talk, to say hello rather than to swing a hungry little fist by way of greeting.
Dunga is constantly involved in fund-raising (see www.capitaodunga.com) to pay for workers, teachers and drivers (the children are collected each morning by a team of drivers and taken to the training ground) needed for more than 130 current projects.
With some extra money from the Golden Foot programme last year, he took about 300 kids to the cinema and then to a McDonalds for a special treat.
Most of them had never been to a cinema before, while when they got to the McDonalds, not only did they eat ravenously but they also filled their pockets full of bread rolls and anything else edible in order to take it home to their families. For Dunga, the experience was an edifying reminder that even the glitzy world of faraway FootBiz can make a difference. Perhaps annual awards such as the Golden Foot serve a purpose, after all.
