Andre Villas-Boas bids goodbye to Gareth Bale

Gareth Bale is heading to Real Madrid. But for real this time.

Andre Villas-Boas confirmed that the midfielder is heading to the Spanish giants after Sunday's loss to Arsenal, ending the summer-long transfer drama. With the transfer window set to close on Monday and Spurs having already spent the cash from Bale's sale, it was all but assumed that he would move on Monday and now the Spurs manager has said as much.

Tottenham manager Villas-Boas finally confirms that Gareth Bale "is going to join Real Madrid so we wish him all the best."

— Rob Harris (@RobHarris) September 1, 2013

And so ends the great summer adventure of Bale and his trip to Real Madrid. The stage will be reconstructed, the shirts printed and magically, Bale will be fit again. It will be a magical day in Spain.

We'll wait to see how much Spurs are going to get for Bale and whether it will be a world record fee, but it is done, finally. And Villas-Boas wished him luck so that's cute.