MADRID: Olympic track and field champion Usain Bolt, the world's fastest man, says he would like to play football when he retires from the track.

“I am serious, I believe I could be good at football, I think I could compete well,” the 24-year-old Jamaican said in an interview published on Wednesday in Spanish sports daily Marca.

Asked if he was eyeing a career with a team in a top flight league like the English Premier League or Spain's La liga, he said: “It is difficult to think of plans with a first-level team.”

“Maybe in the future one of those teams will invite me to play for them. But I think that first I need to play a few charity matches to see how I develop,” he added.

Bolt stormed to Olympic gold at the 2008 Beijing Games in a world record time of 9.69 seconds and then bettered that to 9.58sec when winning the world title in Berlin a year later.

He mirrored that feat in the 200m, also setting world records, latterly of 19.19sec in the German capital.

Bolt, a Manchester United fan, met with the Red Devils at their training ground in 2009.

He was a defensive midfielder when he played football in high school.