From Tele-text score updates to transfer hoaxes, record-breaking goals and regretful tweets on your timeline, sport and social media have an interesting future ahead.

After Wayne Rooney's (record-breaking) 50^th England goal, he went into the dressing room and made a speech to his teammates. This time, the FA recorded a video and put it on Twitter. That tweet engaged over 3000 followers in less than an hour.

Two of the UK's most lucrative industries – football and digital media – are colliding. The football world is paying close attention to what might be their most valuable PR platform.

It's not just Rooney's video. Manchester United and Manchester City unveiled their new signings, Juan Mata and Raheem Sterling, on Twitter and Vine; the English FA debuted the 2014 World Cup squad in a tweet series.

'81% of Twitter users engage with Twitter whilst watching sport…two thirds of the UK talk about football on twitter', said Alex Trickett, Twitter's Head of Sport, at the Soccerex conference on Tuesday, the conference gathers together the greatest business minds across the football world.

Some of the better-financed clubs are already investing in this market. Real Madrid, Barcelona, Manchester United and Chelsea are currently leading the digital pack, with a combined following of 296 million social media fans. The sporting world, dubbed as a 'currency' for Twitter by Alex Trickett, is beginning to realise the value in social media and use it to their advantage.

The digital revolution by Italian club AS Roma proves how lucrative investing in a digital media strategy can be for a club. Their Director of Digital Business Shergul Arshad explained that 'everything is connected. The more fans interact with the brand and spend time on our site, the more it helps the AS Roma brand. Over time we monetize with e-Commerce, ticket sales, AS Roma Membership Program and our early forays into social gaming and Apps.'

But it was a bizarre lie – a lie that went viral – which showed just how powerful a tool social media could be to football.

Nicknamed 'the social media illuminate' by the Huffington Post, Steve Bartlett is the Founder and Managing Director of Social Chain, a media company that created a fictional player called 'Rex Secco' (a clever anagram for Soccerex) in an attempt to get the country talking about a supposed £34m signing to Arsenal FC. His company, Social Chain, specialise in controlling the social media chatter.

Within a few hours, the story was trending on Twitter and some users were claiming they had seen him play.

Though a drastic exercise, Bartlett has his finger on the pulse of the next generation of fans whose money will drive the clubs forward.

'Young people rarely watch sports games with just one screen', Bartlett said on Tuesday, calling this the 'multi-screen sports' age.

There is of course a risk to the increased use of social media in sport; a host of regretful tweets from the likes of Joey Barton and Saido Berahino spring to mind. However, the risk arguably does not outweigh the return, and judging from the evidence and hearing from the experts, more followers equates to a bigger brand, which ultimately results in more profits.

Carl Konadu is Chair of the Youth Advisory Panel for Spirit of 2012 and Commonwealth Youth Sport for Development and Peace Working Group Coordinator