Is this the year of Bale?

Gareth Bale began the new La Liga season by scoring twice in Real Madrid’s 3-0 win at Real Sociedad on Sunday and Guillem Balague and Graham Hunter discuss whether this could be the Welshman’s year in Spain.

Bale enjoyed a brilliant campaign with Wales at this summer’s European championships, where his eye-catching displays helped guide his country all the way through to the semi-finals in France.

And with his Real team-mate Cristiano Ronaldo currently out injured, the spotlight is now firmly on Bale as Madrid look to wrestle the title away from rivals Barcelona.

Balague and Hunter, though, both firmly believe that the Wales international can now finally step out of Ronaldo’s giant shadow at the Santiago Bernabeu and may even live up to AS’ front-page headline on Monday that read: ‘La Liga de Bale’.

Here is how Sky Sports’ two Spanish football experts debated the issue on this week’s Revista Bitesize….

GRAHAM HUNTER: We were both at the European championship and we both saw something Real Madrid could draw conclusions from if that proposition – La Liga de Bale – is going to come true.

You have been talking about it for quite some time: how the struggle for power and domination between Ronaldo and Bale was changed a little bit last season in that Ronaldo – who began the season not in fantastic form – began to realise that whenever Bale played, it was more likely they won and it was more likely that he himself would score.

And so Real found that in the last third of last season they achieved the greatest equilibrium the pair had achieved – 12 straight victories, nearly winning the title and winning the Champions League.

For Wales, you saw predominantly what you and I have been talking about since Bale joined – the entire Welsh team played for Bale, they understood his role, when to give him the ball. They looked for him all the time in the way that Real had been looking for Ronaldo all that time.

If Real Madrid, [Zinedine] Zidane and Ronaldo can appreciate Bale now in all the things he is superlative at, then maybe that proposition that you put forward can come true.

GUILLEM BALAGUE: The things …

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