Bale's position at Madrid hits new low as he is accused of 'negligence'

  /  autty

Gareth Bale will be back on the bench on Tuesday night as Real Madrid try to save their season by reaching the Champions League quarter-finals.

He has become the poster boy of this failing campaign – every article laying in to the team carries his picture.

Santiago Solari will return Lucas Vazquez to the starting XI alongside the 18-year-old Vinicius and Karim Benzema. Bale, who was accused by one Marca columnist on Monday of having an attitude that 'bordered on professional negligence' will start on the bench.

The situation is unsustainable. On Saturday night in a press room full of reporters waiting for Solari to appear one radio station was already reporting that Bale had left the stadium before the end of the game.

Sources close to the Real Madrid dressing room denied the story claiming he had stayed for Solari’s post match talk with the players. On Monday – with one Marca reporter repeating the accusation – Sportsmail consulted sources close to the player and was told the story was ‘complete garbage’.

The cracks that appeared to open up a month ago when Bale was stunned to hear whistles directed his way in a home game against Alaves. The previous weekend he had come back from injury to score within seconds of coming on against Espanyol.

Things have got worse since then. The team is having trouble scoring goals and even when Bale is not on the pitch – as was the case for most of the Copa del Rey defeat to Barcelona last Wednesday – it’s Bale’s fault.

Real Madrid have failed to score in 10 games this season. That has not happened at this stage of a campaign in 10 years.

The team has scored 87 goals in 44 games. That is the worse return since 2007. Bale is the team's second top scorer with a goal every 160 minutes which is only slightly down on Karim Benzema's goal every 158 minutes but the buck stops with a player who has been painted as a surly, self-interested outsider and has not been able to change that image – in part because of his non-engagement in Spanish with the local media.

Real Madrid's problems have been made worse because many of their failures have come at home or at the hands of Barcelona – or both, as in the last two games.

Madrid have played Barcelona in four games this season and the aggregate score is 10-2. The team has lost six games at home so far – again another low at this stage not beaten since the 1999-2000 season.

The danger for Bale is that, until now, he has been protected by the president who signed him in 2013. But with the finger of blame is beginning to turn towards Florentino Perez for not having bought a replacement Cristiano Ronaldo last summer, he might no longer enjoy that support.

Real Madrid have a 2-1 lead from the first leg against Ajax and should go through. But after two straight defeats in which the team failed to score in both games the confidence has been hit.

Ajax were given the weekend off by the Dutch league keen for the team to go into this second leg as fresh as possible. Real Madrid are also without Sergio Ramos who serves the first of his two match ban.

It will not be easy for Real Madrid. They have not scored since February 17 and only Schalke have a worst record of the last 16 teams left in the Champions League in terms of defeats or failures to score in games.

If the season does end  – with three months left – due to defeat by Ajax then Bale will not be the only one under intense pressure. Solari will increasingly feel the heat of every Mauricio Pochettino comment uttered in post-match press conference at Tottenham or of every Jose Mourinho's comment uttered in his various pundit appearances.

And president Perez will feel the heat of supporters' demands for a major signing. Neymar's comments to Globo TV that 'anyone would be tempted by Real Madrid' will be replayed on permanent repeat.

For Bale the hope is that the team stay in the tournament and that away from the hostile environment of the Santiago Bernabeu he can get back to his best form. It will difficult to do it at home with so many of the team's own supporters against him.

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