Bale in action again. On the bench, he laughed at Hazard, whom the coaches did not send into the game

Gareth Bale is renowned for his behaviour on the bench. Ever since he stopped playing for Real Madrid, he has been attracting attention on the pitch instead of at least on the bench. It was the same in the Copa del Rey quarter-finals when he taunted Eden Hazard.

As Real Madrid took on Athletic Club in the Copa del Rey quarterfinals, coach Carlo Ancelotti had a tough choice in attack. For the injured Karim Benzema was not available, Vinícius Junior and Rodrygo returned late from the Brazil national team meeting and were very tired after the hard travel.

Nevertheless, both youngsters started in the starting line-up, along with Marco Asensio, who took the position of the false nine. The only ones left on the bench were former stars Gareth Bale and Eden Hazard.

Ancelotti is renowned for his frugality in substitutions. He doesn’t like to tinker with the line-up, if he doesn’t have to, he doesn’t change his base much. So in the 60th minute he only replaced the exhausted winger Vinícius, who had visibly had enough after a busy schedule, but neither Hazard nor Bale came into the game.

In fact, the Italian strategist pointed to Isco, the second substitution came in the 76th minute when Kroose replaced Camavingo. And that’s when a very interesting scene came from the Real Madrid bench.

Hazard, who had been warming up for the entire second half, was instructed by the coaching staff to sit back on the bench. As the Belgian footballer walked over, Bale laughed in his face.

Bale doesn’t care so much about football anymore. Famously, his sign read “Wales. Golf. Madrid. In that order.” It may have been meant as a slight exaggeration, but it’s not far from the truth. He played a couple of games early in the season, got injured after the national team meeting and was out until the next national team meeting.

He made a miraculous recovery for the Wales game and what happened when he returned to Madrid? The 32-year-old is out of contract in the summer and everyone in Madrid is looking forward to getting rid of this “burden with a huge salary”.

Source: Twitter, Livesport