I think its time for Gareth Bale to come ‘home’. Back to the club that created him. Ok, he was born in Wales, started as a kid at Southampton but it was at Tottenham that he changed from being a rather unfortunate left-back with a record for never having played in a winning match, to being the world’s most expensive, if not actually its best, player. Harry Redknapp did it. Waved his magic wand, shifted him a bit further upfield and the next thing he’s shaming the most elite defenders the European super clubs could find to try and tame him. But they all failed. He was, for long periods, ‘unplayable’. Which is a footballing euphemism for ‘just hack him down and take the yellow card’, because you won’t be able to stop him otherwise. He moved into a more central role, but often over to the right. So he could cut inside onto his amazing left foot. The mirror of the role Ronaldo played at Real Madrid. Hmmmmm…

Bale was fast, strong and incredibly gifted. When he picked up the ball, anywhere on the pitch, Spurs hearts beat faster. He created a frisson, a danger, that was simply wonderful to experience. Lots of players are great, but it takes a Ginola, a Hoddle, a Klinsman or a Bale to inject adrenaline straight into your eyeballs.

And after becoming pretty much the best player in Europe for a season, the rules of the game are such that Real Madrid HAVE to buy him. They’ve always got a new president, and/or a new manager, often both and although claiming poverty, can always manage to find just another 100 million Euros for the hottest prospect in the game. And thus did ‘umble young Gareth find himself in the world’s richest club environment (not counting Manchester City or PSG because they really have nothing to do with football in the proper sense… just that they win a lot…)

But rather than thrive there, our prince started developing frog-like tendencies. Ronaldo resented his presence and the fans never really took to him, even when he won them, single-handedly, four Champions League trophies.

So now, on the verge of his 30th birthday, with a manager who hates him, he sits on the bench, or in the stands, rarely gets a call and has to console himself with another 600,000 Euros going into his bank account for that, and every week. Which is a lot of consolation, I grant you.

Unless Real are prepared to sell him cheaply, which they might do, to save the salary, he will languish there as the highest paid ex-player in the game. To move, should a club be found to pay the transfer fee, he will not, and his agent certainly will not, want to take a cut in pay. And there’s maybe 4 clubs in the world that could match his 30 million a year pay packet, and none are short of world class players. And won’t pay that sort of money for basically a partial failure.

There are few people who could face the humility of sitting out the remaining three years on a contract, doing nothing, for 600 grand a week. Ok, I’d certainly be one of them, but its not on offer. OR, Gareth could decide that for his final years in the game, he could afford to take a significant pay cut (he can’t have spent it all) and actually start playing the game he loves once more. Somewhere he knows he’ll be loved and adored. Like he was last time. It’s not like he’s ‘down to his last 9 Bentleys’ or anything.

So he’s going to come back to Spurs. 50 grand a week. Free transfer. Lamella will donate his number 11 shirt for the cause.

Makes so much sense.

To me.

Happy Monday

A xxxx