Gareth Bale

[metalgear]

Re: Gareth Bale

i hope we get first dibs on him should Real sell....

 

[Spur of the moment]

Re: Gareth Bale

Cheers for the info

Thought this deserved to not get lost at the end of the previous page as I imagine a lot of people are wondering who this is



Obviously. Although I'm not sure where you're getting "an even chance" from?

I disagreed with the statement "they will take a season to bed in and adapt to PL". I'm aware that it can go either way, that's part of my argument.

How far do you want to go back? This is just off the top of my head so no doubt you will disagree with some, but that many?

Hit the ground running

Walker
Kaboul
Friedel
Verts
Adebayor
Dembele
Keane
Berbatov
Ferdinand
Woodgate
Nelsen
Gallas
Van Der Vaart
Crouch
Corluka

So-so

Modric (you may argue but he only really blossomed when moved into midfield)
Kranjcar
Hutton


Struggled

Gomes
Naughton
Khumalo
Sandro
Sigurdsson
Lloris
Dempsey
Bent
Bentley
Rebrov
Dos Santos
Gilberto
Saha
Pienaar
Bassong
Boateng
Bale
Rocha

 

[braineclipse]

Re: Gareth Bale

I totally agree the club is bigger than Bale. My point being that in losing players like Bale, especially in the eyes of the 99.9% of the worlds football consuming population looking from the outside in who are not Tottenham fans like us looking from the inside out, we unfortunately also lose the ability to be something bigger, more special to them. In todays world, that is crucial.

It has been identified time and time again, none better than at Tottenham itself. "The game is about glory", "Better to fail aiming high, than to succeed aiming low". That is infinitely more true now than ever. Look at what the world watches on YouTube. It's not Micheal Carricks excellent positioning and distribution. Its the things that raise the hairs on the back of your neck. Madrid correctly pinpointed the essence of what footballing glory and excitement is in todays quick consumption, reflected glory world and acted spectacularly upon it with the Galicticos plan. They have scraped one Champions League, (partially) with this plan at the very outset, and not really very much since. In fact, from a certain point of view it has not worked on the pitch, and even looks a little gaudy to "proper" football supporters. But despite this, despite Barca being better for a long time now, Real are still regarded as the most glamorous, glorious club in world football, and post turnover figures commensurate with this.

Only the unusual and relatively sudden success of La Masia and the extraordinary luck of having arguably the greatest player ever blossom for them keeps Barca a nose ahead on the pitch, and remotely in touch for the affections of the masses.

Indeed, the fine lines, the fragility... luck even, of the crossroads in how great things become so can be illustrated by the Premiership itself. The propensity of the English language across the world allowed the Premiership and Sky to burst forth and claim the riches of emerging Asian markets. It is arguably the defining reason for propelling itself so far ahead of other great footballing nations in terms of the share of the spoils. If Germany is able to continue offering a superior product, that playing field could change again sometime.

My point about Porto or Benfica was not regarding their potential for growth. It was to highlight the way people feel in general looking in at them after they move on the players that once attracted the gaze and excitement of the masses. They are a good example, because the model they employ (a good and necessary model, due to the constraints of their environment) gives us the chance to make a direct comparison of what happens to a club in this situation in a condensed timescale, of a season or two. They remain very good clubs and teams, often competing near the top level. But it is at the expense of ultimate glory. They, in effect, are the anti-Galacticos. It keeps them solvent, even quite near the top, but there is something deep within that which turns the majority of the casual football consuming population off. This they must begrudgingly accept that as their reality if they are to stay true to their model, and stay alive. Porto, Benfica, Ajax, Celtic. By living this existence, they will never be able to know if they can match and surpass Madrid and Barca, as they often did before the playing field of world football became altered.

The lesson in there for Tottenham is that, whilst it is patently clear we are not in the Portuguese (or Dutch, or Scottish) league, we are still similarly hamstrung, like them, by our current position below the very top table, and only something spectacular will capture the imagination to drag us up. Tottenham is less of a legendary club than Benfica, Celtic and Ajax so in adopting facets of their admittedly successful and very necessary model, how can we ever hope for a true breakthrough? They have proven conclusively that it is a model more geared for survival than crossing the event horizon, which is where Tottenham currently find themselves.

Of course, your scenario is entirely possible, also. A less spectacular team, more efficient, may have a spectacular tilt at the title. In Lamela, there could indeed be a player that stands the best chance of capturing the imagination of people as Bale does. That can happen, I don't doubt that. United lost Beckham. Ronaldo was a superstar for United later on. Things change, new heroes emerge. The thing is, no matter how good a deal it was for United, how many new heroes emerged it is the enduring image in the worlds collective mind of Real Madrid being the apex predator over United that feeds into the notion of Madrid being the greater club. The ultimate, and entirely intended, successful outworking of the Galactico policy, regardless of the trophy room.

It's a little of the chicken and the egg. If United forced Ronaldo to stay, won the Champions league, relegated and eroded Madrids myth in subsequent years, would he (or the next Ronaldo) see Madrid as preferable to United. Possibly not.

All I'm pointing out is that once -in-a-blue-moon players like Bale are really the only ones that can drastically change the fortunes, mythical or otherwise, for clubs. At this moment we have one of the only weapons that brings greater glory to sports teams: a megastar.

Granted, we have other assets. A fantastic infrastructure and team to make a good fist of it if we trade our only cow for some magic beans. But if they don't happen to grow,well, we are just the people who have lots of beans, and clubs like Madrid remain gorging on all the steak!

A lot of things you say I don't disagree with in principle.

To try to state my disagreement very briefly:

I don't think a team like ours needs a superstar like Bale or Ronaldo to grow in stature, popularity, fan base and so on. Yes, if we wanted to push on from a "Manchester United" to a "Real Madrid" position, sure. But that's not even close to our situation. Results will bring CL, money, attention, a stadium sponsorship. Everything we need to continue our growth.

Ultimately keeping Bale this season was our choice, unless he signed a new contract next summer he would have 2 years left. We would have to sell or expect a massive drop in value over that next season. We wouldn't be able to keep him around forever, whereas a fantastic infrastructure, a well run club, a team with multiple super talented young up and coming potential superstars, that we can bring with us.

I think we have a great transfer team that seem likely to bring in some fantastic players. Before signing anyone else we could have 7-8 starters in next summer's World Cup for some big to massive teams like England, Spain, Brazil,, France and Belgium. Our current reported targets (Willian, Lamela and Coentrao) could add another 2-3 potential starters for 3 of the biggest national teams around.

I think there's a lot of potential there short term for that something unquantifiable you want. Longer term there's even a chance we could bring another real superstar through.

 

[Spurs7891]

Re: Gareth Bale

Will be very disappointed if we sell Bale now. Should have sorted out his future before the season started. To sell our best player once the season started is wrong timing. It might affect the moral of other players. Also, whoever we buy to replace him now will take long time to settle down at Spurs.

 

[braineclipse]

Re: Gareth Bale

How far do you want to go back? This is just off the top of my head so no doubt you will disagree with some, but that many?

Well, seeing as I'm a bit of an argumentative, opinionated bastard you're probably right about that

I have no interest in discussing those individual cases. I was just wondering where you got that estimate from. It just seemed a bit plucked out of thin air and overly specific was all...

 

[braineclipse]

Re: Gareth Bale

Will be very disappointed if we sell Bale now. Should have sorted out his future before the season started. To sell our best player once the season started is wrong timing. It might affect the moral of other players. Also, whoever we buy to replace him now will take long time to settle down at Spurs.

I imagine this complaint will be one shared by several posters.

Hypothetical question, say the £93m valuation presented as the accepted bid by that Italian journo is correct and that's the deal we've struck and assuming that this is a result of negotations across the summer how much less would you suggest we should have been willing to accept at an earlier point?

At what point did the club make the right decision to keep the negotiations going?

Another point is that it seems that we've been able to do some good business before potentially selling Bale. Surely selling Bale first thing would have made it more difficult for us to get good value in the market?

 

[chicken_badge]

Re: Gareth Bale

Will be very disappointed if we sell Bale now. Should have sorted out his future before the season started. To sell our best player once the season started is wrong timing. It might affect the moral of other players. Also, whoever we buy to replace him now will take long time to settle down at Spurs.

I do not know what the situation was. But suppose we told Corinthians, Valencia etc "We aren't selling Bale" then they can't assume there is a £80m+ war chest to raid.

If our team really don't expect Bale to stay - and no one is begging right now - then this is by far the best order of business for THFC.

 

[WhoopWhoop]

Re: Gareth Bale

No problem if we bring lamela and willian in but once again a precedent has been set and likes of Sandro vertonghen must be thinking if I want a move next summer all
I got to do is pull a hissy fit like modric and bale and I'll be allowed to leave.

 

[nerdved]

Re: Gareth Bale

Will be very disappointed if we sell Bale now. Should have sorted out his future before the season started. To sell our best player once the season started is wrong timing. It might affect the moral of other players. Also, whoever we buy to replace him now will take long time to settle down at Spurs.

Had we sold Bale for 93m in June, any transfer target of ours would only have been made available at a 50% premium. See Liverpool after Torres for a similar situation. I wouldn't worry about the morale of the squad - most of them will be thinking "great - could mean more possibilities for myself".

 

[Spursalot]

Re: Gareth Bale

No problem if we bring lamela and willian in but once again a precedent has been set and likes of Sandro vertonghen must be thinking if I want a move next summer all
I got to do is pull a hissy fit like modric and bale and I'll be allowed to leave.

Huh? That's only assuming Bale is leaving.



Plus Modric threw a hissy fit and we made him stay for another year.

 

[NovTHFC]

Re: Gareth Bale

No problem if we bring lamela and willian in but once again a precedent has been set and likes of Sandro vertonghen must be thinking if I want a move next summer all
I got to do is pull a hissy fit like modric and bale and I'll be allowed to leave.

I disagree. I think we have cleverly signed internationals clumped in groups, eg the Belgians, French, Brazillians.

Belgians (Dembele, Vertonghen, Chadli)
French (Lloris, Kaboul, Capoue)
Brazilians (Gomes, Sandro, Paulinho, Willian?)

If its true that we're signing both Willian & Lamela, then I'd be extremely shocked if we didnt cruise into 4th spot, & would be disappointed if we didnt push the top 3 with our current squad w/without Bale.

 

[braineclipse]

Re: Gareth Bale

No problem if we bring lamela and willian in but once again a precedent has been set and likes of Sandro vertonghen must be thinking if I want a move next summer all
I got to do is pull a hissy fit like modric and bale and I'll be allowed to leave.

That precedent has not been set by us. That's just the way football works these days. We've resisted player power as well as anyone I can think to compare us to, but realistically both Sandro and Vertonghen would have known what was what a long time ago.

 

[Spurs7891]

Re: Gareth Bale

I imagine this complaint will be one shared by several posters.

Hypothetical question, say the £93m valuation presented as the accepted bid by that Italian journo is correct and that's the deal we've struck and assuming that this is a result of negotations across the summer how much less would you suggest we should have been willing to accept at an earlier point?

At what point did the club make the right decision to keep the negotiations going?

Another point is that it seems that we've been able to do some good business before potentially selling Bale. Surely selling Bale first thing would have made it more difficult for us to get good value in the market?

IMO, we should have had a cut off date to buy and sell key players. It always unsettle the team when we buy and sell players even after the season started. We should have told Bale that he is staying at Spurs unless Real come up with the required money before the season started. Don't know why we should give Real all the time in the world to buy Bale. With so many players we bought, you can't help but worried this is going to be another "transition" season.

 

[Spursalot]

Re: Gareth Bale

IMO, we should have had a cut off date to buy and sell key players. It always unsettle the team when we buy and sell players even after the season started. We should have told Bale that he is staying at Spurs unless Real come up with the required money before the season started. Don't know why we should give Real all the time in the world to buy Bale. With so many players we bought, you can't help but worried this is going to be another "transition" season.

A cut off for selling players works fine. You can just refuse to do business.


A cut off for buying players is a bit baffling though, they don't have to be introduced into the squad that quickly and there are two clubs to every transfer. You can't just demand that the selling clubs sell their players to you, that's not what negotiating is, and we can't just stump up the money they want, as we're not oil rich. Also you can get good deals late on in the window. I don't think we should primarily rely on these, however if they are there for the taking we would be fools to not think about it.


It'll be a transitional season for many top clubs with the managerial changes. The majority of our squad has been with AVB for a year, changes to the team are expected.

 

[braineclipse]

Re: Gareth Bale

IMO, we should have had a cut off date to buy and sell key players. It always unsettle the team when we buy and sell players even after the season started. We should have told Bale that he is staying at Spurs unless Real come up with the required money before the season started. Don't know why we should give Real all the time in the world to buy Bale. With so many players we bought, you can't help but worried this is going to be another "transition" season.

Was that an answer to my post?

 

[JerusalemMan]

Re: Gareth Bale

No problem if we bring lamela and willian in but once again a precedent has been set and likes of Sandro vertonghen must be thinking if I want a move next summer all
I got to do is pull a hissy fit like modric and bale and I'll be allowed to leave.

Quite the opposite.
Modric staying a year and not being allowed to join Chelsea actually shows us sticking to our guns and lets players know that Levy won't let them go at the first hint of cash.
All the Bale case shows (if he leaves) is that we will reluctantly accept a world record bid for a player having carefully purchased replacements.

 

[scaramanga]

Re: Gareth Bale

How far do you want to go back? This is just off the top of my head so no doubt you will disagree with some, but that many?

Hit the ground running

Walker
Kaboul
Friedel
Verts
Adebayor
Dembele
Keane
Berbatov
Ferdinand
Woodgate
Nelsen
Gallas
Van Der Vaart
Crouch
Corluka

So-so

Modric (you may argue but he only really blossomed when moved into midfield)
Kranjcar
Hutton


Struggled

Gomes
Naughton
Khumalo
Sandro
Sigurdsson
Lloris
Dempsey
Bent
Bentley
Rebrov
Dos Santos
Gilberto
Saha
Pienaar
Bassong
Boateng
Bale
Rocha

Hold up.

You can't include **** players that always were **** and continue to be **** as an example of players struggling to adapt/settle.

 

[Viper]

Re: Gareth Bale

I disagree. I think we have cleverly signed internationals clumped in groups, eg the Belgians, French, Brazillians.

Belgians (Dembele, Vertonghen, Chadli)
French (Lloris, Kaboul, Capoue)
Brazilians (Gomes, Sandro, Paulinho, Willian?)

If its true that we're signing both Willian & Lamela, then I'd be extremely shocked if we didnt cruise into 4th spot, & would be disappointed if we didnt push the top 3 with our current squad w/without Bale.

Ah right so we are losing Bale because Wales doesn't have any more decent players

 

[milo]

Re: Gareth Bale

IMO, we should have had a cut off date to buy and sell key players. It always unsettle the team when we buy and sell players even after the season started. We should have told Bale that he is staying at Spurs unless Real come up with the required money before the season started. Don't know why we should give Real all the time in the world to buy Bale. With so many players we bought, you can't help but worried this is going to be another "transition" season.

How would that work if the manager decided that a player was a disruptive influence and he no longer wanted him at the club after that deadline or the club received a bid for a player that far exceeded our valuation?

 

[africanspurs]

Re: Gareth Bale

a few things i have come to realise

1. We knew that if we didnt make CL we would most likely lose Bale. That "one more season" was last season. not this one. Why is it a pill that is so shocking in taste when really we knew in all liklehood this would be the case


2. We have operated in such a way that minimises Bales absence. Imagine if we get all our desired targets, i'm sorry but if that happens that our squad is better this year than it was last year

.
3. 93 MILLION ****ING POUNDS!!!! is an obscene amount of Mula. That kind of money can make us really count for something going forward. Do people honestly believe that all this money going round...assuming that we get all our targets....is money that we would even contemplate spending if we could balance the books? (the soldado still throws me off though i must admit). Lets look at our team with bale and no big name record breaking signings..., compare that with our team WITHOUT bale and 6 ****ing FRANCHISE players to add!!! Bale's price tag is more to do about commodity than it is to do with ability. If one of our new signings scores 20 plus goals and is marketable then Levy is going to try any wrangle another top fee. Madrid are the only team dumb enough to make this kind of bid, no one else would touch it


4. My conspiracy brain thinks that our relationship with Madrid id actually very much intact and in the FULL effect. I think this Bale thing could easily play out in our favour and i think madrid are helping with this. Its a top level conspiracy though, to be able to hide an agreement and act your part of warring with a partner just so that your partner can get thier targets without being over charged. I always said that for X amount AND madrid help us get our targets then they could have bale. I was definately joking and taking the tinkle (as i meant that they should go out there and do the persuading for us like our agents) but this could be the next best thing. There is actually a chance that we would not be able to get any of these targets had madrid not come in for Bale

5. Bale is going abroad, he isnt strengthening anyone domestic and his departure is bringing in some serious talent by the BUCKET load. There is a silver lining in this whole situation

6. He has not actually left yet, there is every chance that we might be able to keep him on lay away for another season with madrid knowing full well that he belongs to them next summer, Fat chance of that being the case but one can dream

7. Tottenham is still around and now our brand is ****ing global. I for one am proud of that and the job levy has done.

the future is bright.