Bale would play every game if he was fit – Mourinho

Carlo Garganese

• Updated: 19 May 2021 14:24 BST
• 1 min read

Jose Mourinho insists that if Gareth Bale could get himself fully fit, then he would play every game for Tottenham.

Bale has had a largely miserable season since returning to Spurs on an expensive loan from Real Madrid last summer.

He has struggled for form and fitness – with critics questioning his motivation – and started just two Premier League games.

However, he has shown signs of improvement this past week.

He scored one and assisted another in the Europa League victory over Wolfsberger on Thursday.

And he came off the bench in Sunday’s 2-1 defeat to West Ham to inspire a much-better second-half performance.

The Welshman assisted Lucas Moura’s consolation and later hit the crossbar.

“I know his quality. I cannot say everything to you, I shouldn’t. I don’t want,” Mourinho told Sky Sports after the match.

“I believe as a coach I don’t have to speak so much about the situation, but with a Gareth Bale completely fit and ready to play 90 minutes of every game, of course he would [play].

“We are trying everything with him to recover him to be at a good level. To play 65 minutes like he did Thursday, then today he couldn’t start the game. He wouldn’t have 90 minutes to give us.

“But I am happy because we know what he brings, he brings his quality.

“[He was] very unlucky [when he hit the crossbar] because in that situation we had a double shot to score but we didn’t.”