Gareth Bale thinks Dele Alli is better than Cristiano Ronaldo, and other things that probably aren’t true

So we’re all pretty much resigned to eventually losing Dele Alli to Real Madrid, right? The Spanish tabloids are too, apparently, and having a former Tottenham player currently at Madrid isn’t helping anything. Spanish daily Diario Gol has a, um, interesting report out today that suggests that Gareth Bale has asked Madrid chairman Florentino Perez to sign Alli this summer for two reasons: because he thinks Alli had a better season than Cristiano Ronaldo, and because he wants a friend who speaks English in the changing room.

El británico ha barrido para casa y quiere tener a un compatriota entre sus filas. La barrera lingüística le aleja de sus compañeros. Le gustaría contar con un confidente en el vestuario y el elegido es Delle Alli.

Bale guarda relación con su anterior club. Sigue asiduamente los partidos del Totthenham Hotspurs y ha alucinado con la temporada del centrocampista inglés. "Es mejor que Ronaldo", habría confesado a su entorno.

“The British player has searched his soul, and wants a compatriot alongside him. The language barrier isolates him from his fellow players. Like anyone else, he'd like to have a locker-room confidant, and it appears he's picked Dele Alli for the task.

“Bale maintains a relationship with his former club, follows their games assiduously, and was blown away by the midfielder's play last season. He's told his entourage that Alli is ‘better than Ronaldo.’”

(With thanks to Raf Naboa y Rivera from Hudson River Blue for the translation.)

Protip: you should never ever take anything written in the Spanish footballing media at face value, and especially not from the tabloids like Diario Gol. I’m not sure which is more ridiculous-slash-sad (“sadiculous?”): that Bale thinks that Dele Alli had a better season in a year where Ronaldo scored 42 goals in all competitions and won the Champions League, or that Bale wants Florentino Perez to sign Alli this summer because he’s lonely and needs someone to talk to.

It’s super dumb and super implausible, and I don’t buy it for a second. I have a much easier time believing the (also terrible) reports coming out of Spain that Bale is one of five players who are done with Ronaldo and ready to help shove him out the door and back to the Premier League.

Dele Alli is a heck of a player, and he’s probably going to a huge club for a massive amount of money. That club is probably going to be Real Madrid, because of course it is. But that doesn’t mean that anything listed above is true, or that Alli is leaving the club this summer. In fact, of all the rumors swirling around Tottenham Hotspur thus far in the transfer window, the ones about Alli are the least believable. I’m pretty sure Alli isn’t going anywhere for at least another year.

So, the moral of the story is: it’s a slow news day, and Spanish tabloids are the worst. Although, if anyone can live in Spain playing top-level football for four seasons without learning even rudimentary conversational Spanish, it’s probably Gareth Bale.