Well the good thing is we've done most of our business early, so we're in a position of saying well if we keep Bale we'll have a great world-class player.
If we sell him i doubt we'll do so without a world-record fee and possibly a couple of great players from Madrid, and we'll spend the fee on a player like Willian or Lamela so we'll still have a s**t-hot team.
So we really are in a position of strength on this one for once! This is the problem Madrid have got. If we were struggling financially the prospect of selling Bale to free up funds to strengthen the team might be attractive. As Lewis appears to have loosened the purse-strings this summer we're in a position of saying to Madrid, we don't need your money, if you want him you're going to have to come up with an offer so ridiculous that your own board, your own fans and your own players and coaching staff as well as the world-media will question you for doing it.
That's the position Perez has backed himself into. He's either going to look a mug as he promised he'd sign Bale and didn't, or he'll end up paying a price so ridiculous he'll look like a clown.
