The age of the epic transfer announcement as come and gone (mercifully) but it appears as though football clubs are starting to settle into a more subtle way of being engaging around transfers on social media.

The days of the take-the-piss video aren’t totally over, you can be sure, and there’s still room for humour and fun as well as hype or even utter seriousness. That goes, too, for everyone using the platforms and especially official accounts – don’t go over the top, but don’t be boring either. There’s nothing worse than that.

There are a multitude of understated ways to announce a signing as we’re seeing this summer. Some have been a mix of informative and creative content, like those West Ham have produced for players like Jack Wilshere and Felipe Anderson.

Others, though, are funny in a more time-honoured social media kind of way. That is, they’re the ones bringing the banter.

When Juventus caused all kinds of drama by signing Cristiano Ronaldo they also solidified their dominance over Italian football even more. And that’s what moved Sampdoria to announce their new signing – Ronaldo Vieira – using the same iconic font that Juventus used to announce their own superstar signing.

BREAKING: #Sampdoria sign #Ronaldo! pic.twitter.com/vTZafVkMBF

— Sampdoria English (@sampdoria_en) August 3, 2018

Samp were fooling no-one, but it seemed to go down pretty well. Everyone loves a subtle joke, especially one where a club – or official account or a celebrity or someone – isn’t taking themselves too seriously.

Creativity is now the order of the times for clubs on social media, but the days of going overboard seem to have ended. It’s now about understated engagement, and hopefully that means we’ll start to see some genuinely funny transfer announcements before the transfer window shuts!