It’s safe to say that Jude Bellingham has settled at Real Madrid to great effect. The 20-year-old has made a remarkable start to his career in the Spanish capital, scoring 13 goals in his first 14 appearances for Los Blancos.
British players have often struggled to live up to expectation at Real Madrid, although Bellingham has blown that out of the water in his time so far. Still, Gareth Bale, the last player from the United Kingdom to play for Los Blancos, offered valuable advice to Bellingham on how to succeed at the club, when speaking on TV show A League of Their Own.
“(He has to) play the game at Real Madrid, because if you don’t “be a puppet” for the media, you’ll get a lot of criticism. A lot of the Galacticos do what the press want, they play that game – it’s probably why I had such a downfall there.
“I didn’t want to (play the game for the media), I just wanted to play football and go home. It hindered me, and it made the press attack me a bit more.”
Gareth Bale basically telling Bellingham do do what he didn't do is to be liked at Madrid is the funniest bit of advice I've heard 1 footballer give to another 😭 pic.twitter.com/Ob9CWD5aJ9
— 𝑅𝓎𝒶𝓃 (@formulaRyan21) November 11, 2023
Bale had plenty of initial success at Real Madrid during his first few years at the club, but that fell away towards the end of his spell. Bellingham will hope that the same doesn’t happen to him.
