Tottenham boss Jose Mourinho has expressed his delight at improving Gareth Bale, but could not resist a cheeky barb in Real Madrid’s direction.
Bale climbed off the bench to head home the first goal of his second spell in north London and it was an important one as it earned a 2-1 victory which moved Spurs up to second in the Premier League.
The Wales international arrived back at Spurs on a season-long loan from Real Madrid in September after a torrid final couple of years in the Spanish capital, where he fell out of favour with Zinedine Zidane and was heavily criticised by the fans.
After the match, Mourinho said: “I’m very pleased for him, especially for him because he deserves that.
“When I have five minutes I’m going to Safari to look at Madrid websites to see what they say.
“He knows we care about him and we know he cares about us, the team and the club, Spurs. He’s the perfect fit, he’s very calm, very intelligent, he has good feelings.
“He had bad feelings before, because the training process was hard, and his body was suffering a little bit, but we gave him what he needs as a whole.
“I am speaking about sports science, medical, my assistants, the other players. I’m very pleased for him to score this winning goal.
“I told already for about a week or so, I’m saying he’s improving. It’s not just by watching him, the data supports our training process. We knew. The good thing is Gareth also knows. We share ideas and share feelings.
“He doesn’t have 90 minutes of a Premier League match in his legs yet so we’re using the Europa League to complement his training process.
“We are using some matches in the Premier League when we decide to play him and the normal tendency for him will be of course to be better and better and better. I always will have this care with him until we feel that he’s ready.”
