As a Tottenham fan who lives in Nottingham; I hear it all the time.
‘Did you know that Gareth Bale was going to join Nottingham Forest?’
I have always maintained this to be absolute rubbish, and thankfully I can now lean on Harry Redknapp’s testimony to put it to bed once and for all.
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A 2019 Nottingham Post article details the fictional story of how, 10 years earlier, Spurs had agreed upon a loan-to-buy deal with Forest for Bale, who was then a 20-year-old left-back on the fringes of Redknapp’s first team.
Speaking on BBC Sport’s Peter Crouch podcast, Redknapp refuted that tale absolutely, saying: “Gareth Bale was scary. People tell me all the time that I was going to loan him out before he made it big but I don’t know where that came from. I was never going to loan Gareth out.
“You looked at him and he had everything. What a player.”
And of course, Harry would never lie. Isn’t he still under oath?
There were also reports, cited in The Telegraph in 2008, that Spurs might send Bale to Middlesbrough in part-exchange for Stewart Downing.
Another complete fabrication, in all likelihood.
We’ve made some major boo-boos in the transfer market but I refuse to believe that lining up Bale’s exit was ever close to being one of them.
I don’t know why, it would just taint him in a way. He is the best player I’ve seen at Spurs and it is painful to think what might (not) have been.
I have to disagree Harry was a good manager and upfront talker. Hes played a mix of youth and experience at all his clubs. Giving the likes of lampard and defoe teenage debuts. Taking west ham into europe. Winning the fa cup with portsmouth. He put together a very good squad for us when levy gave him control of transfers to save us from relegation. He took us to champs league (bale was injured much of that qualifying season).. When he said he needed 2 or 3 quality players to challenge for the title then he was brought litter and then sacked… Try reading any of redknapps books, he has written a good few, some good informative stuff, he knows his football man he has alot of experience and knowledge. Most average joes would learn a thing or 2 about football from his writings.. He goes alot more in depth than ‘go out and play lads’.. For me redknapps team was as good as pochs.
I believe the story of Bale going to Forest, lets be honest HR who is basically full of bull**** only wanted players who were old and experienced so he didn’t have to coach em, his coaching style was “just go out and play lads”, then we had a problem on the left, in comes Bale, the rest is history.
I believe him hes always known his players. Young and old schnapps was good at this. He was backing a teenage frank at spam when many were against him. He always played Bale for us though Gareth was always injury prone, cant see why he would have wanted to sell his better players. He put together that team. Levy gave him good control over transfers to save us… Maybe Levy was stupid enough to ponder such a deal, but not Redknapp.
I’d like to believe Arry , but I may as well believe this governments stats on the pandemic, the only one who would tell the truth is Gareth.