Gareth Bale - A Comparison

Gareth Bale, the world is his proverbial oyster right now but what does the future hold?

From his beginning at Southampton at the tender age of nine Bale has been on the path to greatness, albeit with some bumps in the road along the way.

When the promising Welshman moved to Tottenham Hotspur for a fee potentially reaching £10 million, his first 24 appearances didn't result with one victory a feat which saw him labelled as a jinx. Although manager at the time, Harry Redknapp, had every faith in Bale - who was a left back at the time.

Bale had knee surgery in 2009 and returned to the Tottenham side for his 25th appearance which put an end to the 'jinx' with a 5-0 drumming of Burnley. It was around this time that Bale made the shift to left midfield and it's fair to say he hasn't looked back since. A huge point of recognition came from Bale's second half hat-trick against Inter Milan in 2010.

This season Bale has had 23 appearances, with 15 goals and an astonishing 9 MOM awards. With 8 goals in his last 6 appearances Bale is on fire at the moment, terrorising Premier League defenders week after week.

Understandably his performances have attracted attention from Europe's biggest names, with reports that both Barcelona and Real Madrid are interested up to the value of £50 million.

Many reports have compared Bale to the two best around, Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo. To compare let's take a look at this seasons stats:

Player	Apps	Goals	Assists	Shots	Dribbles	Avg. Passes	Pass Suc%	Crosses
Messi	24(1)	38	9	5.5	4	61.4	85.2	0.2
Ronaldo	23(1)	24	5	7.1	1.6	31.9	77	0.3
Bale	23	15	1	4.9	2.2	34.4	78.4	2.1

The first thing to notice is that Messi is unreal.

Now moving on to the comparison, Bale is a distance behind both with goals and assists - which in my view is what an attacking midfield player should be judged on. Note the crossing statistics which indicate that Bale is playing in a wider role, which may explain his lack of goals. This is supported by his lower shooting statistics, suggesting that he may not be in a scoring position as often as the Argentine and Portuguese. Looking deeper Bale has played centre attacking midfield on three occasions this season scoring 5 goals, could this be his next position?

The improvement area for Bale has to be his assists, with only one in 23 appearances this is something he is no doubt looking at. On the face of it the statistics offer no obvious justification, but looking at the top two assist leaders in the Premier League perhaps passing is his weakness. Juan Mata and Steven Gerrard both have 9 assists this season, with 1308 (85%) and 1810 (86%) passes completed with % success. This is compared with 791 (78%) for Bale, a considerable difference.

On recent form it's certainly fair that Bale gets a mention with the very best, but I believe he is still some way off the likes of Messi and Ronaldo. At 23 he still has time on his side and it will be very interesting to see what bids come in at the end of the season. I doubt he'll be a Tottenham player for the 2013/14 Premier League season and keep your eyes peeled for another change in playing position.

JL