Bale Absent For Spurs Friendly as Reactions Trail His Forecast World Record Transfer.

Gareth Bale has not traveled with his Tottenham teammates ahead of the pre-season friendly against Monaco on Saturday.

Wales Superstar Bale Shows Off His PFA Player and Young Player of the Year Gongs at Last Season's Award Ceremony.
Wales Superstar Bale Shows Off His PFA Player and Young Player of the Year Gongs at Last Season’s Award Ceremony.

The Welshman is believed to be nursing a minor hamstring problem and doesn’t want to ruin his prospective world record transfer to Real Madrid with further aggravation.

Reports in the UK Times suggests that Spurs chairman Daniel Levy will sit down for the first face-to-face talk with Real Madrid president Florentino Perez in Miami next week after the 24-year-old forward made his intentions known to the London club that he wants to speak to the Spanish club about a transfer.

Real manager, Carlo Ancelotti, says Real and Spurs are in negotiations over a deal and there are other reports that Levy is holding out for a transfer fee in excess of ÂŁ105m while Real are willing to pay in excess of the world record ÂŁ80m paid Manchester United for Cristiano Ronaldo in 2009.

Apart from featuring in the first-half of Tottenham’s pre-season friendly against Swindon on 16 July, Bale has missed the game against Colchester and did not feature in the Asia Trophy matches.

Meanwhile former Real manager Jose Mourinho has said he tried to sign the Spurs forward for the club last season.

“I asked the club to buy him last season but it was not possible,” Mourinho told ESPN on Saturday.

“It looks like it is happening this season so I am happy for them because they get a fantastic player but, of course, the numbers are huge numbers and the kid has to go now and there’s pressure to prove that he’s worth that investment.”

On Friday Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger claimed Bale’s much speculated record transfer to Madrid makes a farce of UEFA’s Financial Fair Play rules.

“It makes a joke of it. It’s quite amazing that in the years where the Financial Fair Play comes in, the football world has gone completely crazy,” Wenger said at a news conference ahead of the Emirate Cup.

“You wonder what kind of impact and effect it has on the football world. It looks like it has made everybody worse than before.”

However, a report in The Sun suggests the much coveted forward bid “an emotional farewell” to his teammates in London on Friday, autographing their shirts before they left for Monte Carlo.

Bale, who joined Tottenham for £10m in 2007 from Southampton, scored 26 goals last season on the way to claiming double gongs in the Professional Footballers’ Association Player of the Year and the PFA Young Player of the Year, capped with the Footballer Writers’ Association Footballer of the Year.

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