Real Madrid’s relentless pursuit of Tottenham Hotspur forward Gareth Bale appears to have culminated in a diplomatic incident, with the UK government threatening legal action against Spain. “It’s so typical of Real Madrid – they always go too far when they become fixated on some other team’s player,” says top football pundit Jimmy Nobbend in his football blog, From the Nobb End. “Not satisfied with spending the better part of the Summer attempting to unsettle the player with endless reports in their tame media talking up the prospects of a transfer, now they’ve got the Spanish government to start imposing these ludicrous border checks at the frontier with Gibraltar!” According to the pundit the latest spat between the UK and Spain over Gibraltar is the result of Real Madrid’s growing frustration with Spurs’ chairman Daniel Levy’s refusal to negotiate with the top Spanish club over Bale. “They’ve realised that he’s not going to budge until they actually offer him money for Bale, rather than a signed photograph of Cristiano Ronaldo,” he explains. “The trouble is that, like the rest of Spain, Real are completely skint. So they’ve come up with this scheme to get their friends in government to put pressure on the UK government via Gibraltar, in the belief that David Cameron, in turn, will put pressure on Levy to give them Bale.”
According to Nobbend, who made over three hundred appearances for Pedigree Chum League outfit Ball’s End Road Rovers, mainly in the refreshment kiosk, but occasionally as a substitute grounds keeper, the Spanish giants were given new hope of landing Bale after the Welsh winger recently failed to land the coveted role of the Doctor in the popular BBC series Dr Who. “He’s been a fan since he was a kid – not just the current series, but classic Dr Who as well, he’s got them all on DVD – and it has been a lifelong ambition of Gareth’s the be the first Welsh Doctor,” he claims. “It’s well overdue for someone from the Valleys to get the role and there was a clear upsurge in favour of it this time – the likes of Dame Shirley Bassey were campaigning for a Welsh Doctor! Is it any wonder Gareth thought he had a real chance?” Bale was heartbroken when a proposed deal between Spurs and the BBC for a straight swap – with Bale becoming the new Doctor and current Doctor Matt Smith playing wide left for Tottenham – was rejected by Daniel Levy and manager Andre Villas-Boas on the grounds that Smith was an actor not a footballer. “Which just shows what they know,” says Nobbend. “Smith once had a trial for Northampton Town.”
In the event, Bale lost out to Peter Capaldi for the role of the Doctor. “Believe me – it’s a move both parties will regret,” opines Nobbend. “Bale as the Doctor could have brought a whole new audience to Dr Who – the Match of The Day types who ordinarily never give science fiction a second look, whilst Matt Smith could have attracted that young geeky Dr Who audience, who would normally shun sports, to White Hart Lane. On top of that, Capaldi is Scottish, the third Scottish actor to play the role! They make the programme in Wales, but won’t cast a Welshman! It’s a calculated insult to a proud Welshman like Gareth! Is it any wonder he was seriously considering leaving the country after that?” With an inconsolable Bale too distraught to participate in his team’s pre-season friendlies, Real Madrid made their bold Gibraltar move. “Real have always had close links to the Spanish government,” claims Nobbend. “It’s well known that they were Franco’s favourite team and that nobody else was allowed win La Liga during the fascist dictatorship!”
Nobbend’s allegations have been dismissed out of hand by the mainstream media. “His claims are utterly ludicrous – he’s clearly making it up as he goes along,” declares Johnny Fishtail, chief football writer for the Daily Excess, which recently reported that Spurs would only allow Bale to move to Real if the Spanish club’s Italian coach, Carlo Ancelotti, used his mafia connections to arrange a ‘hit’ on Arsene Wenger, coach of arch-rivals Arsenal. “It isn’t as if he doesn’t have form for this sort of nonsense – a couple of years ago he was claiming that then Tottenham manager Harry Redknapp was negotiating with the Cuban Communist Party for a part exchange deal which would see David Bentley moving to Havana and top left-winger Fidel Castro coming to White Hart Lane. According to him, Harry reckoned that Fidel could have brought some much needed pace down the left, providing the perfect complement to ‘Lenin’, who they already had on the other flank!” Nobbend had also been heavily criticised for a 2009 story claiming that, as part of his attempts to lure the Honduran midfielder to the club, Spurs manager Harry Redknapp attempted to strike a deal to secure the release of then Wigan player Wilson Palacios’ kidnapped brother, offering six million pounds, plus striker Darren Bent.
Nobbend, who was forced to retire from the game after his feet were scalded by a leaking tea urn, has vigourously defended his reporting. “Listen, I’m ‘In The Know’, I am! I’ve got contacts in the game – my Uncle Reg once sold a second hand Vauxhall Victor to Stan Bowles!” he says. “Just because a lot of the stuff I write about never gets reported in the so-called ‘legitimate’ media, it doesn’t mean that it didn’t happen! Take that Palacios business – his brother’s kidnappers were apparently interested in the deal, but Bent couldn’t agree personal terms with them, so it fell through!” The pundit also has new claims concerning the Gibraltar crisis. “Creating queues at the border obviously hasn’t been sufficient to force Spurs’ hand, so now the Spanish bastards have got their bloody monkeys that live on the rock to start stirring trouble,” he reports. “They’ve got those bloody Macaques throwing their shit at British tourists, when they aren’t breaking into people’s hotel rooms and wrecking them!” Johnny Fishtail has responded to this latest report by pointing out that the monkeys in Gibraltar aren’t actually Spanish. “They originate in Africa – they’re Barbary apes, for God’s sake,” he sighs. “Can’t that stupid bastard get anything right?” Nobbend is undeterred by this criticism. “I bet they claim they come from Africa originally, not Spain,” he opines. “Blame the Africans, eh? We know all about the state of race relations in Spain – we haven’t forgotten the abuse their racists directed at Lewis Hamilton, then tried to pretend it was a ‘joke’. Well, maybe we should get Bale to black up – I bet the Spaniards wouldn’t be so keen on him then, eh?”
