After showing Benitez the exit route on Monday evening, Real Madrid have appointed Zinedine Zidane as head coach on a two and a half year contract. However, Guillem Balague insists Real Madrid’s best player this season, Gareth Bale, is upset and ‘devastated’ with the sacking of Benitez.
Gareth Bale’s first two seasons at Real Madrid were brilliant and poor respectively, but the Welshman has been on fire again this season, with 9 goals and 7 assists in 13 appearances under Benitez.
Balague says Bale was ‘devastated’ when Benitez had to go
Since signing for Real Madrid in 2013, Bale has been constantly linked with Manchester United, and a part of the football world believes that the deal might materialise now that Benitez is sacked. But Balague is confident that Bale will not leave Real Madrid anytime soon.
“Let’s first ask why he was unhappy,” Balague was quoted as saying by Sky Sports.
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“A lot of the players at Real Madrid are not playing as a team, they are playing for themselves and he has been brought up with the concept of a team to work well. So he was devastated, because he felt that Rafa was actually working in that direction of making it work as a team, and for half an hour against Valencia everybody did what they had to do.”
‘Bale wants to stay, and Real Madrid want him to stay’
While putting the 26-year-old in the market is the logical thing to do for Bale’s representative, Balague suggests Real Madrid will not let any deal fructify, as they want Bale to stay at the Santiago Bernab u.
“I can tell you something – Real Madrid has no intention of letting him go. That’s what they are saying at the moment but that will always be there the sense that if it doesn’t work there will be clubs in England that will want Gareth Bale.
“But he wants to be there that’s the latest I have heard from him. And Real Madrid want him to stay.”
Were Real Madrid wrong in sacking Bentiez?
Benitez lost just thrice in 25 games this season, and qualified to the knockout stages in the Champions League with two games to spare. The elimination from the Copa del Rey had nothing to do with the team’s performance either. Benitez is the 11th manager that Florentino Perez has sacked in his reign, and one can’t help but think that it may turn out to be yet another mistake by the Real Madrid authorities, that could leave the club in a perilous position.