The wait is over for both Gareth Bale and Real Madrid. And yet both came to their senses after nine years together.
While captain Marcelo was celebrated like a king and even the also departing Isco, like Bale long since sidelined in sporting terms, once again addressed a few conciliatory words to the Bernabeu, the microphone passed the Welshman by. His final farewell, at the celebration of Sunday night’s Champions League triumph, was a quiet one.
The great promise – and how it was kept
It all started in the summer of 2013 – with this impressive figure. 101 million euros in transfer fees, allegedly more expensive than Cristiano Ronaldo, the first three-digit million footballer. Also a future world footballer? Expectations and footballing promise were immense.
Nine years later, as a footballer he is at most still perceived in the national team, a royal chapter ends – probably at least two years too late – with a lot of aftertaste. And yet also with the almost forgotten realisation that the once swift-as-an-arrow winger was probably worth his money.
On Wednesday, some had no longer expected it, Bale said goodbye via social media after an “unbelievable experience” with the conclusion that his “dream has honestly become reality”. Because all that really did happen.
In Bale’s first season in 2013/14, playing on the right wing opposite Cristiano Ronaldo, he scored his famous winning goal in the Copa del Rey final (2-1 against FC Barcelona) – and weeks later virtually also the 2-1 winning goal in the Champions League final (4-1 n. V. against Atletico Madrid). Bale, typical Real Madrid, was a final player. That brought the royals money, that brought the royals glory.
Even in his early years, however, there was a lack of consistency, mostly due to his vulnerability to injury. Both of these things distinguished Bale from CR7, whose counterpart or successor he never became at any time. The 32-year-old has to accept that. Nevertheless, he was usually on hand in important games and decided a CL final against Liverpool in 2018 even when he was no longer even a regular player and certainly no longer a superstar.
More goals than Ronaldo, more titles than Zidane
Gareth Bale’s story at Real Madrid is one of success, as he too is now one of those players who has won the top flight five times (!). Which, with the exception of this season, he has been anything but uninvolved in. He has won more titles at Real than Zinedine Zidane (19), scored more goals than the Brazilian Ronaldo (106) and set up more goals than David Beckham (67). Bale is a Real legend, there is no getting around that.
But his story in Madrid is also that of a man whose former passion seems to have become more and more lost in a professional business for which one must also be made. “I love my family and golf,” Bale, who was criticised for it, admitted blatantly in 2020. “That’s what makes me happy.”
By the final farewell, which all parties had finally longed for, all the dust had settled. The Bernabeu preferred to remember the positive swings of a player who in nine years at Real had actually only ever moved between the extremes and, as a sign of gratitude, gave him once again what had increasingly given way to whistles in recent years: applause.
