Sky Sports journalist Jim White has confirmed that sources close to Gareth Bale do not believe that a move to Manchester United is on the cards this summer, despite reports suggesting the Welshman is surplus to requirements at the Bernabeu.
The Welshman’s future has been under scrutiny this summer after it was reported by Marca and other Spanish media outlets that Madrid would be willing to let him leave in order to secure the services of AS Monaco starlet Kylian Mbappe.
Jose Mourinho, speaking at a press conference ahead of Man United’s UEFA Super Cup clash with Real Madrid, made it clear that Man United would move for Bale over the next few weeks if it emerged that the 28-year-old was indeed no longer needed by Zinedine Zidane ahead of the 2017/18 campaign.
But White, speaking on talkSPORT, has revealed that one of Bale’s representatives told him that no such move was even likely to materialise over the next few weeks.
“I’ve been speaking to one of his representatives and its not all its cracked up to be,” he said. “Is it likely to happen? It certainly doesn’t seem that way.
“I’ve been speaking to one of Bale’s representatives [and I asked] is it likely? Would he move? He text back: ‘Why would he? Also I don’t talk about rubbish journalism.'”
If we were talking about any other club, this development would pretty much stop the move in its tracks. The news would move on to something else. But this is Madrid. And this, more importantly, is Florentino Perez’s kingdom.
A litany of Madrid stars have been performing well at the Bernabeu in the past, expressing no desire to leave whatsoever, only to be told that, actually, they had to move along – not because of substandard performances, but simply because selling them off and ushering in somebody else would outweigh keeping them on the payroll on a commercial and financial level.
Wesley Sneijder, Arjen Robben, Robinho, Angel di Maria, Mesut Ozil are all examples of players who did nothing wrong at Madrid but ended up being shoved out the back door nonetheless. Could the same happen with Bale?
