Gareth Bale: A 'Martian' Running Out of Time at Real Madrid

Barcelona put Real Madrid to the sword on Wednesday night in a 3-0 victory at the Santiago Bernabeu to progress to the final of the Copa del Rey, 4-1 on aggregate.

It was a humiliating defeat for Los Blancos in their own house. Gareth Bale came on as a second-half substitute, but he failed to affect the game. The Welshman's only notable showing was a break he made inside Barcelona's defence with a few minutes to go, but he ballooned his shot wide. The miss drew hoots of derision.

When the referee blew for full-time, Bale made a beeline for the tunnel. As he walked off the pitch—alone and neglecting to shake hands with any of Barcelona's victorious players—he looked like a man who lives in his own world.

Bale has endured a tough time. He's getting hammered by the Spanish sporting media. He's unloved by his own fans, and his team-mates' lack of solidarity has been noticeable. Instead of support from them, he's got scorn.

In an interview with Belgian newspaper HLN in February (h/t Sport), Real Madrid goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois went into detail about how Bale sat out a team-bonding dinner because he needed to be in bed by 11 p.m. He added the kicker that Bale's nickname in the dressing room is "The Golfer" as he prefers to flee back to Britain to indulge his passion for the sport rather than hang out in Spain.

Bale's failure to assimilate in Spain, having moved to Madrid in 2013, is a stick that's used to beat him with. One of Bale's other team-mates Marcelo, who sits beside him in the dressing room, claims Bale only speaks in English and that he communicates with him through "gestures."

"He is kind of like a Martian, like an alien who's landed from space," says Alfredo Relano, editor of Diario AS. "He's a solitary guy and a bit cold. He has his entourage [from the UK] but he doesn't have many friends in the squad. He's friendly with Luka Modric from their time together at [Tottenham Hotspur], but few else."

On Sunday, Bale scored Real Madrid's winner against Levante in La Liga from a penalty. He appeared in a foul mood, again having entered the fray as a second-half substitute. He has only started two of Real Madrid's last nine matches since returning from injury in late January. As he wheeled away from the penalty spot, his team-mate Lucas Vazquez tried to embrace him in celebration. Bale shrugged him off angrily. It was an ugly gesture.

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"The Bale incident was clearly the expression of an unhappiness that has been building up with him and Real Madrid," says John Carlin, author of fly-on-the-wall book on Real Madrid White Angels. "We've known for quite a long time that he's not settled in the Real Madrid dressing room. Bale has never managed to win the love of the Real Madrid masses, and that love has been systematically eroded season after season. It reached its nadir with that incident against Levante, which is going to have far-reaching consequences."

There was a time when Bale was "untouchable," part of Real Madrid's fearsome attacking trident, the "BBC" (Bale, Benzema and Cristiano). Those days are no more after Cristiano Ronaldo left for Juventus last summer. Karim Benzema remains, but Bale has lost his place as an undisputed starter largely because of recurring injury.

He has been sidelined 23 times during his Real Madrid career because of physical issues. There is also a perception he lacks an appetite for work on the pitch, a trait that is prized at a Bernabeu stadium whose glory was built on the fighting qualities of the mythical Alfredo Di Stefano.

"Bale has lost his place to Lucas Vazquez ... who works a lot, and Vinicius Junior on the left, who has excelled under Santiago Solari," says Relano. "Bale is a brilliant player. He scores fantastic goals, but because of his injuries he hasn't had continuity. It doesn't surprise me that he's lost his place in the starting line-up. Zinedine Zidane lost faith in him for the same reasons. For a trainer, he's a player who is a bit confusing. He can do great things but because he [fears] injury, he holds himself back. That's a problem in the end."

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Bale lost his place in Zidane's starting XI because Zidane preferred to add a fourth midfielder in a 4-4-2 to gain more control over games. Isco was predominately the beneficiary, with Marco Asensio and Vazquez also being called on. The team functioned better without Bale. As a club legend, and in the middle of a startling accumulation of three UEFA Champions League titles in a row, Zidane had the authority to make the call—even though Bale was a presidential favourite and the most expensive signing in the club's history.

Dropping Bale was something Carlo Ancelotti, for example, was unable to do. Ancelotti referenced in a late-February interview with Il Napolista (h/t Marca) to the trouble he got into with club president Florentino Perez when he substituted Bale in a league match against Valencia in 2015.

Ancelotti was incensed that Bale squandered a goal chance by selfishly going it alone instead of passing to Benzema, who was in a better position to score. Real Madrid lost 2-1. Withdrawing Bale drew the ire of Perez, which led eventually to Ancelotti's dismissal. Zidane carried greater weight than the Italian, though.

"Zidane convinced Florentino that it was better to leave Bale in the dugout for the most important games," says Diego Torres, a journalist with El Pais. "Thanks to the titles he won and to his charisma, his aura as an idol in Real Madrid, Zidane could overrule the president who always looked favourably on Bale. The president only changed his opinion of Bale because of recent incidents, in particular following Bale's incident in the Levante match last weekend. Bale has lost all the confidence the president had in him. He's no longer a protected player, a guaranteed starter." 

This was supposed to be Bale's breakout season. With the departure of Ronaldo, who left because of a frosty relationship with Perez, Bale was the president's big bet. The gamble has failed. While his strike partner Benzema has grown in stature this season, Bale's status has dwindled. He has been overshadowed by 18-year-old Vinicius Junior, with the uncapped Brazilian a revelation since being given his chance by Solari.

"Vinicius is popular because every time he gets the ball, he attacks defences," says Relano. "He still doesn't finish properly, but he unsettles the opposition. Nowadays football is more like handball—with teams passing from one side of the pitch to the other. There's no space. Vinicius breaks that dynamic with his speed and energy. He's a novelty, a breath of fresh air. Football for him is a spectacle. He's a player who is really loved by Real Madrid's fans."

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Vinicius has a woeful conversion rate. He's shot 75 times this season for Real Madrid but only scored three times. Real Madrid's supporters cut him slack, though. In Wednesday's Clasico against Barcelona, he missed two chances toward the end of the first half in the space of a minute. After the second, he turned to Real Madrid's fans in the north end of the stadium and raised his arms in the air, urging them on. The stadium responded with some visceral chanting. He has them in the palm of his hand. It makes the isolation of Bale more pronounced.

Bale is not the first British player to have trouble adapting overseas. Michael Owen, for example, fled the Bernabeu after a season. He could never settle in Spain. David Beckham, however, was a crowd favourite with Real Madrid's fans during a troubled period in the club's history. He only managed to win one major trophy (the Liga title), which came in his fourth and final season at the club. Like Bale, he didn't speak fluent Spanish, but it didn't stop Beckham from wooing Spaniards with his charm.

"Bale doesn't try to project a positive image in the way, say, that David Beckham did," says Carlin. "Beckham went out of his way to do little PR numbers off the field by which he won over the press and fans. Basically, Bale doesn't give a damn most of the time. 

"Not long after arriving in Spain, Beckham went to see the people at Madrid's two big sports newspapers, Diario AS and Marca. He made a point of chit-chatting to the secretaries and the cleaning ladies. Of course the reporters noticed that and mentioned it in articles about him.

"I remember when I did my book about Real Madrid, I'd travel with the team and we'd get back from a match at maybe three or four o'clock in the morning. There'd always be a gaggle of Real Madrid fans waiting at Barajas airport. The only one who unfailingly stopped and did photographs and autographs was Beckham. He was attentive to that side of things that Bale manifestly is not."

Bale's agent, Jonathan Barnett, likes to come out to bat for Bale. He once dismissed Bale's former team-mate Ronaldo as an "underwear-seller." On another occasion, Barnett said Bale's team-mates at Real Madrid weren't passing him the ball.

"Jonathan Barnett doesn't have a good reputation here in Spain," says Relano. "He's known because he has been sowing discord, saying things to upset others."

According to El Mundo on Tuesday, Barnett is adamant that Bale continues with Real Madrid as he tries to unseat Jorge Mendes in Spain as the country's leading agent. Barnett was listed as the second-biggest agent in all of sports by Forbes magazine in September, and his firm, Stellar Group, has made inroads at Atletico Madrid and Valencia's youth academies. On Thursday, it was announced it had added Atletico Madrid crown jewel Saul Niguez to its books. Bale is Barnett's calling card in Spain, so it's in the agent's interests to keep him at Real Madrid, with whom the Welshman has a contract until 2022.

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"Jonathan Barnett is a very good representative for Bale," says Torres. "He's been able to influence the decisions of the club—to convince the president that his player is a fantastic player. Agents are like car salesmen, and Jonathan Barnett has managed to persuade people that the product he's selling is of a very high quality and it deserves a very high price in the market and at Real Madrid. He does excellent work for Bale."

Torres believes, however, that Bale will be sold this summer. Relano is unsure, owing to the vagaries of the transfer market. It depends on who is available to buy. Real Madrid's designs on Eden Hazard, for example, might be scuppered if Chelsea's transfer ban is upheld. There are other unknowns. Bale may dig in. If—and it's a big if—Bale were to be the catalyst for another UEFA Champions League triumph, his stock would rise again, as it did after his stunning bicycle kick against Liverpool in last season's final.

"Real Madrid tried to sell Bale in the summer of 2017, when it wanted to buy Kylian Mbappe, but Mbappe didn't come here because Bale, Benzema and Cristiano were in front of him," says Relano. "Jose Mourinho wanted Bale for Manchester United at the time, but Bale didn't want to leave, so the deal for Mbappe fell through. Bale could be sold, but it depends on how the season finishes. Football changes from one day to the next. The game is fluid. What is for sure is that the people of the Bernabeu don't have any affection for Bale."

Bale might have an opportunity to change their minds if he makes a decisive impact in Real Madrid's La Liga fixture against Barcelona, who return to Madrid on Saturday. Revenge will be on the minds of Madridistas, whose chances in the league title race are hanging by a thread. They trail Barca by nine points, and a winning goal by Bale would help to redeem his reputation after a difficult week.

Follow Richard on Twitter: @Richard_Fitz