It's time for Gareth Bale to pick up the phone when Premier League clubs call

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Transfer deadline day came and went, and Gareth Bale remained untroubled.

Arsenal bid for a winger, but not Bale. Liverpool, too. Chelsea need goals but Bale was not on their radar. Manchester City wanted a forward, but not him.

They had all got the message. He is happy where he is. Even had they called, he wouldn't have answered.

Gareth Bale is facing a defining season in Madrid, as he attempts to keep his place in the team

For how much longer, though, is harder to say. Bale is 28 and this will be a defining season for him in Spain.

His fitness is increasingly an issue, his place in the Real Madrid team is under serious threat. The notoriously fickle Bernabeu crowd have also been on his back in recent matches.

Understandably, Bale wants to prove he can overcome these struggles. He is at the best club in the world. Why would he want to leave?

It may not be his decision. Marco Asensio, 21 and one of Spain's brightest young players, is laying claim to a regular place. In the absence of Cristiano Ronaldo, suspended, Zinedine Zidane has been playing Asensio and Bale. When Ronaldo returns, Zidane has a decision to make. And there is no doubt who has made the better start.

Asensio has four goals to Bale's one. In the most recent match, at home to Valencia, Asensio scored twice, while Bale's performance was derided and he was substituted.

Bale, of course, loves Madrid and his record there is magnificent. He has won the Champions League on three occasions, plus La Liga, the Copa del Rey, the Club World Cup, two UEFA Super Cups and a Spanish Super Cup.

The rise of Marco Asensio has left Bale's place in doubt, and Madrid fans are on his back

He has scored goals in some of Real Madrid's greatest games — including a header in La Decima, their 10th European title.

He also helped steer Wales to the semi-final of the 2016 European Championship, and may yet get them to the 2018 World Cup. They face Moldova on Tuesday night, in what is an increasingly tight group. Bale has transformed Welsh football in a way not even Ryan Giggs could.

Increasingly, though, it feels as if the tide is turning at Madrid. Bale has had 17 injury absences during his time there, and has been unavailable for almost half the matches — 47 per cent — during his four years at the club.

Unavoidably, that takes a toll. In his first season, Bale scored 22 goals and was credited with assisting another 19. Last season, that figure dropped to nine goals and five assists, with Bale missing much of the season.

He did not play between November 22 and February 26 or between April 23 and June 3, when he made a 13-minute substitute appearance in the Champions League final.

The Welshman is happy in Spain, but Premier League clubs could well come calling next year

It was after this that Bale reiterated his determination to remain. Zidane did not sound as sure.

Playing for Wales against Austria on Saturday night, Bale looked off the pace, which could explain the jeers and whistles that met his performance against Valencia, when the home fans sensed a lack of effort. Few would recognise that trait in Bale, but not all criticism is fair.

It can, however, have a lasting effect. The Bernabeu will want to see more of the exciting young Spanish native Asensio, and will not care if Bale is sacrificed.

Equally, as much as Bale may love the lifestyle and the thrill of playing at the pinnacle of club football, he is far too young to be marginalised for long.

Considering that a fit Bale, prolific scorer that he is, could be a deciding factor in the Premier League title race, it is hard to imagine another deadline passing without him at least being required to answer the telephone. And this time, it may make sense to pick up.

Bale could be prolific in the Premier League, and he may be required to consider a return

Bit rich of Spain's elite clubs to decry state aid  

If UEFA are serious about investigating state-subsidised football they know where to start: Spain.

It is ironic in the extreme that La Liga president Javier Tebas wants European football's governing body to discipline Manchester City and Paris Saint-Germain. Spain's elite clubs have been receiving state aid for over a quarter of a century.

Tebas is trying to pressurise UEFA to sanction these Gulf state interlopers, at the request of Real Madrid and Barcelona, who fear their supremacy is under threat. Tebas says the sovereign wealth of PSG and City 'distorts European competitions' and is 'irreparably harming football'.

La Liga president Javier Tebas wants PSG, who signed Neymar this summer, to be disciplined 

Well, Spain would know all about that. It was July 2016 when European Union competition commissioner Margrethe Vestager demanded the repayment of millions in soft loans, tax breaks and sweetheart property deals given to seven La Liga clubs. Chief among them? Real Madrid and Barcelona.

Yet there is a big difference between City having the properly legal and open backing of Abu Dhabi, and the secret and dodgy land sale cut between Real Madrid and the city government. As ever, clubs shouting loudest about fairness are those that fear a challenge to the old order, having acted unfairly for so long.

Bayern Munich also object, while being as good as Germany's official football club. They buy the best players from their rivals, turned the Bundesliga into a one-team league, attract the wealthiest German sponsors, and the city and state gave €210million in infrastructure support for their new ground. They are very pious about state-funded football, too, you can be sure.

Arsenal try to make fools of us all 

Ivan Gazidis's salary may be testament to the old adage that you can fool most of the people most of the time, but how stupid does he think his staff are?

After another transfer window with little on its side bar mystery, Arsenal's chief executive sent an email offering perspective 'amid all the hysteria'.

Leaving aside the irony of a club who bid £92million for Thomas Lemar hours before the window closed presuming to lecture on hysterical acts, Gazidis also had an imaginative take on the Alexis Sanchez fiasco.

Keeping hold of him was, Gazidis said, 'a clear statement of our ambition'. This is rather different to the statement Manchester City believe they heard Arsenal make when they said they would sell Sanchez for £60m.

Ivan Gazidis said keeping hold of Alexis Sanchez was a 'clear statement' of Arsenal's ambition

City were so encouraged that they placed a party on the ground in Chile waiting to complete the deal. When Arsenal failed to secure Lemar it was called off. Not exactly a clear-headed statement of ambition, then. More a series of haphazard events.

Wayne Rooney was probably driving less erratically when he was nicked by Cheshire Police in the early hours of Friday morning. Still, if Arsenal's staff buy this, who knows what else they will fall for? Do you know the word 'gullible' isn't in the dictionary, Mesut? Go on, look it up.

Mahrez on the shelf

Was there a more pitiful sight on deadline day than Riyad Mahrez hawking himself around Europe in the desperate hope of getting a move out of Leicester? It is now fairly obvious that his effort this season has been aimed, not at knuckling down, but at impressing a suitor. 

Unfortunately, it seems too many recall his half-hearted displays as Claudio Ranieri sank last season to take a chance. Always worth remembering, too, that if a club are interested, they will come to you. If they haven't, it means they're not.

Riyad Mahrez was hawking himself around Europe in the latter stages of the summer window

Sullivan has picked a fight he can't win 

What point is there in West Ham continuing to argue with Sporting Lisbon over William Carvalho? They tried to get the player; they didn't get the player. That's the end of it.

Instead, co-owner David Sullivan issued a statement on Friday that as good as threw manager Slaven Bilic under a bus. He implied that West Ham could have had Renato Sanches from Bayern Munich, or the West Brom signing Grzegorz Krychowiak, but Bilic did not want them. He said Sporting were willing to sell Carvalho on deadline day but it was too late. If the aim was to deflect any criticism of his stewardship, it backfired.

The majority of West Ham supporters like Bilic and do not wish to see him undermined in this way. Having lost three games and bottom of the league, they feel it hurts the club to continue putting pressure on the manager.

West Ham's pursuit of William Carvalho could end in a legal battle with Sporting Lisbon

Then, as a result of this unnecessary detail about West Ham's transfer business, Sporting Lisbon director Nuno Saraiva called Sullivan a liar and a parasite, and said the club made no bid for Carvalho. Sullivan is now threatening legal action and has produced details of a £23million offer spread over three years — substantially under what Sporting wanted or what West Ham fans thought had been tabled. There is also some confusion over the process, with Sullivan saying the offer was made to the agent and a Portuguese intermediary, with an email sent to Sporting's president.

Sullivan feels understandably aggrieved at being insulted, but what does it really matter in the context of a fast unravelling season?

Signing Carvalho would have greatly impressed the fans, but more importantly the players and manager. He is exactly what West Ham need in midfield. Winning a war of words in the aftermath is therefore of little relevance. The only win that West Ham must get is against Huddersfield next Monday. Nothing beyond that counts.

Is Levy really such a wizard of the window?

There are some narratives in football that are just accepted, regardless of the circumstances. One of them is that Daniel Levy, chairman of Tottenham, is the wizard of the window, the don of deadline day. What Daniel wants, Daniel gets, runs the story — and at the best price, too.

So it was this year — despite a start to the season that saw Tottenham drop five points in three matches, and take one point from six at home. One imagines Levy didn't want that — and maybe wouldn't have got it, had Tottenham strengthened their squad earlier, but this was conveniently ignored in the rush to acclaim the Premier League's prime mover.

Daniel Levy has a reputation for being a transfer guru, but this summer was underwhelming

So what business did Levy do? He bought a short-tempered right back, a veteran reserve striker, a third-choice goalkeeper, a teenage centre back for the future — and the most expensive player in the club's history, who might not start. For such a great negotiator, £36m rising to £42m for Davinson Sanchez of Ajax is hardly a bargain. Nor were the previous record signings Sanchez has usurped: Moussa Sissoko (£31.5m), Roberto Soldado (£27m) and Erik Lamela (£27m). Not one of them has made a grand success of his time at White Hart Lane.

Yes, Serge Aurier is considerably cheaper and three years younger than Kyle Walker, but he never had the right back role at Paris Saint-Germain to himself — 57 league appearances in three seasons — and his fee was depressed by issues with discipline, including an assault that previously affected his visa status. Fernando Llorente is a good alternate to Harry Kane, but had Tottenham moved earlier it might not have been such a difficult August. Juan Foyth and Paulo Gazzaniga are reserves for now, and no more. So it was a decent window, in the end, but hardly a work of greatness.

The club who got it right were Manchester United. They went early, they bought class, and have reaped the benefit in their start to the season. They even persuaded Paul Pogba to join them a year earlier when they could only offer Europa League football — apparently the deal breaker for Thomas Lemar and Arsenal.

Yet the narrative demands that United's executive vice-chairman Ed Woodward is a transfer-window klutz and Levy the genius; so that is the way it stays.

Renato Sanches wanted the number 85 at Swansea, but the Premier League rightly rejected it

Last call for the silly bingo shorts 

Credit to the Premier League for rejecting Swansea's request to give Renato Sanches the No 85 shirt following his arrival from Bayern Munich.

These listings are becoming increasingly ridiculous. At CSKA Moscow, after recording 11 numbers between one and 17, they jump to 24, then 35, 42, 43, 63, 66, 72, 75, 89 and 99. It's a football team, not a bingo card. It is little different at Spartak Moscow — 19 numbers up to 30 and then random, ending with 69, 71, 98 and 99.

The Premier League made it plain that numbers should be consecutive or close to the current highest. Sanches will wear 35, although what was wrong with 3, 9, 19, 23, 24, 28-32 or 34 — all currently unused at Swansea — heaven knows.

Maria Sharapova unleashed a full arsenal of weapons in her US Open fourth-round match with Anastasija Sevastova. She screamed in an off-putting manner, she called for the physio when her opponent was in the ascendancy. Still it wasn't enough. After her 5-7, 6-4, 6-2 win, Sevastova expressed a wish to return to the prestigious Arthur Ashe court for her quarter-final match. Having never failed a dope test, however, she shouldn't get her hopes up.