Southampton linked with Gareth Bale transfer swoop | OneFootball

With Southampton now under new ownership after Sport Republic, backed by Serbian media mogul Dragan Solak, bought Gao Jisheng’s 80% stake of the club earlier this week, it hasn’t taken long for transfer rumours to emerge, this time linking the Saints with a very familiar face.

According to a recent report from El Nacional, Solak has identified Real Madrid star and former Saints player Gareth Bale as his first acquisition in charge of the south coast club.

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Having started off his career at Southampton, Bale has gone on to make 536 senior appearances for the Saints, Tottenham and Real Madrid, scoring 183 goals, providing 140 assists and winning a plethora of trophies along the way, including four Champions League titles.

Despite being 32 years of age, the Welshman showed last season that he still has what it takes to perform at a high level in the Premier League by racking up 11 goals and two assists in 20 top-flight appearances during his loan spell at Tottenham. He also ended up as their second-highest rated player for the campaign, with an overall performance rating of 7.3/10 according to .

Having been described as having a “magnificent” left foot by Sky Sports pundit Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink, Bale’s potential return to St Mary’s this month would surely stun a lot of Southampton fans. It would be a real statement of intent by Solak and highlight his aspirations for the club moving forward, considering Bale’s pedigree and experience.

However, given the Welshman’s previous struggles with injuries, which have also kept him sidelined for most of this season at the Bernabeu, this will need to be taken into consideration if Southampton decide to make a move for the winger this month.

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If the Saints can manage to secure a deal for Bale, who is currently valued at £4.5m by Transfermarkt, and if he can overcome his injury woes, it will be interesting to see if he would be able to replicate the goalscoring form he showed at Spurs last season this time around for Ralph Hasenhuttl.

If this were to happen, he would surely give Southampton a great chance of potentially ending the season in or around the top half of the Premier League table, duly delighting a lot of Saints fans in the process.