HOW I TURNED GARETH BALE INTO A SUPERSTAR –
I had to toughen him up – and stop him playing with his hair If Ronaldo is threatened by him Madrid will be a very lonely place
THERE is some right old rubbish talked about Gareth Bale’s time with me at Tottenham. Was I ever going to sell Bale? No. Was I going to loan him? No. I’ve heard talk — everyone from Richard Keys to Alex McLeish — making it sound as if what happened to Bale’s career was a fluke and that I never fancied him.
Whatever faults I may have, I do know a player. Go right back to the first team I ever picked as Tottenham manager, against Arsenal on October 29, 2008, Bale was in it.
It’s true we had some work to do with him but he was one of the players I was most looking forward to working with when I went to Tottenham as manager. I really fancied my chances at getting the best out of him — he struck me as an exceptional talent: strong, quick, with a superb shot.
It upsets me that people believe I was ready to ditch him — although the story had been told so many times that maybe even Gareth thinks it is true. Alex McLeish says I was going to loan him to Birmingham City when he was their manager. Although I remember the conversation, it never got beyond the wait-and-see stage and would only have happened had I thought Bale couldn’t get enough matches with us.
Nottingham Forest wanted him on loan too, with a view to a permanent transfer, but I did not entertain that for a second. I would never sell Gareth. All he needed was to be toughened up to emerge as a star player.
We had to tease that combative streak out of him because, at that time, he was regarded as a left-back and was up against Benoit AssouEkotto, one of the best i n the Premier League. Gareth seemed too soft to be a defender, so we decided to try him further forward.
He drove me mad in training. Technically, he was outstanding but he always seemed to be playing with his hair. It was never right. He’d be flicking the fringe or wiping it out of his eyes and I would be going quietly mad, just watching. ‘ Gareth, leave your barnet alone! Gareth! Stop touching your hair!’
He was always getting a little knock in training, too. He’d go down then
It is nonsense to say I wanted to sell Gareth
limp off and I always thought the physios made too much fuss of him.
It was the same pattern every morning: Gareth would tumble and stay there, and they’d all go running over. In the end I told them just to leave him alone.
‘Don’t worry,’ I said, ‘he’ll be fine in two minutes. If it is anything urgent we’ll soon know.’ That’s what they did and, as predicted, Gareth got up, got on with it and got better and better. With Gareth, it was all about building up his confidence.
We shifted him to wide left and moved Luka Modric inside, so they would l i nk up. And we were beginning to hurt teams.
That Tottenham side had a nice balance and Gareth began showing the form we saw on the training ground. At the crucial closing stages of the season he scored the goals that proved to be the difference in victories over Arsenal and Chelsea.
Those matches set us up for a sprint to the finish line and in the end it came down to a match away at Manchester City on May 5, 2010. Whoever won was going to claim that last Champions League place.
I think that was one of my defining matches as a manager because of the way we played. I decided that it did not matter that we were the away team, this was a cup final, a one-off, and we were going to go for it, with an attacking team.
Without wishing to stereotype, maybe Roberto Mancini’s Italian nature got the better of him. Serie A teams often tend to be quite uite cautious and perhaps he did d not f eel comfortable taking the he risk we did. We played like ke the home team. I thought ht we could get at them — particularly down the he flanks. Aaron Lennon was half fit but he came me through for us that night ght and Bale was immense. se. Peter Crouch scored the winner.
We were in the Champions ons League — and I knew that hat would be the time when hen Gareth would arrive on the world stage.
I predicted he would d be our Cristiano Ronaldo. And that’s just what he was. as. I don’t think I have ever seen one player terrify a team m so completely as Bale did Inter nter Milan. I felt sorry for their heir Brazilian right-back. It was embarrassing. By the end of it the fans were singing: ging: ‘Taxi for Maicon,’ and I don’t think his career has ever recovered.
I had always felt there was more to Gareth than left-back, or even left wing. Don’t get me wrong, if he wanted to be a left-back he could be the best in the world, another Roberto Carlos. Even if he had stayed in that role his whole career, he would still be an extraordinary player. He can rip a team to pieces from deep or further forward on the left, but there is so much more to his game.
Gareth is a player capable of going free through the centre of the pitch, either as a forward or just floating and arriving anywhere he fancies.
I had talked with our coaches for a number of months about using Gareth this way because teams were crowding him out on the left flank, putting so much traffic in his way
that it was just getting harder and harder.
At least through the middle he would have three options: left, right or dead straight. On the flank he was beginning to run out of pitch.
I remember the new plan coming together against Norwich City on December 27, 2011. He was magnificent, scoring twice as we won 2–0.
Unfortunately, Gareth’s switch then coincided with a few dicky results for us and a few people, looking for easy answers, put two and two together and ran out of fingers.
They would chant, ‘Gareth Bale — he plays on the left’ as if this little innovation through the middle was the cause of all our problems.
Of course, a year later when he was scoring for fun in that position in
Andre Villas-Boas’s team, it was hailed as a genius move. The bottom line is
Not natural for him to behave in an assertive way
that Gareth can play anywhere. I think Carlo Ancelotti, his coach at Real Madrid, will view him the same way as me — a free spirit, not tied to any one position.
His biggest test will be to step out of the shadow of Cristiano Ronaldo with confidence. That won’t be easy.
Ronaldo is a huge star at Madrid and will probably want to take nine out of 10 free-kicks — at least. Gareth will have to assert himself and that will require a strong mind.
He has to think ‘I’m an £86million player’ and act l i ke i t, taking responsibility, claiming the ball when he fancies his chances. And yet at the same time he cannot dwell on his fee and what it means too much, because that would put him under immense pressure. It is a tricky balancing act. He will have to be ready for the matches when he goes it alone, has a shot, misses and Ronaldo starts throwing his arms up in the air.
He cannot, at that point, go into his shell and become this timid little creature. But it is not natural for Gareth to behave in an assertive way. Don’t get me wrong, he knows he is good. The fee is crazy, amazing
money, but he wouldn’t have fought so hard to get the deal done if he didn’t fancy his chances of living up to expectations in Madrid.
Yet, equally, Gareth is a quiet lad, who spends time with his girlfriend and family, and I’m not sure being in the same bracket as Ronaldo and Lionel Messi will suit him.
I saw the photographs of him on his first day in Madrid, surrounded by relatives, and wondered how that young man will fare with a paparazzi camera being pushed into his face wherever he goes. His relationship with Ronaldo is the key to it all, because if the football is going well then all the added stresses are a minor irritation and nothing more.
If the football is a struggle, the other aggravations appear 10 times worse.
Not many major British players go abroad and those that do are as likely to fail as succeed.
If Ronaldo feels threatened by Gareth’s arrival, Madrid could be a lonely place so he will need to lean a lot on Ancelotti, who speaks good English, and Paul Clement, Carlo’s assistant, who is English.
Luka Modric is another old friend who could help him settle in.
The one thing the club cannot provide for Gareth and Cristiano is a ball each — so they will need to work hard on that partnership because they are such similar players. They
Real must not make him into a support act
are freaks, really. They can both shoot, both are good headers of the ball, they can both make 50-yard runs and stand over six feet.
Madrid must guard against Gareth f alling i nto the role of support act. He had a little trouble adjusting to the bigger environment o f Tottenham after leaving Southampton and this is 10 times as great as that move.
If I have a worry it i s that I remember the days when Gareth’s confidence was draining fast at Spurs and there were genuine fears he might not make it.
He wasn’t the strongest of characters back then and he cannot be allowed to fall into that same negative state of mind.
If it doesn’t start like fireworks for him he will need Carlo to make sure he does not become isolated, left alone with his thoughts. He won’t like the attention a difficult start brings either. Gareth is a very private person and he won’t enjoy having every move scrutinised.
The positive is that Gareth has grown a lot since his earliest days at White Hart Lane. His performances improved but so did his attitude.
He wasn’t flash or cocky — never the sort to be up the West End with a bottle of champagne — but he was more assured.
He has to take that maturity to Madrid, though, or it will be hard.