Bale calls for changes as a result of relentless footballing calendar

Gareth Bale has stressed the importance of player welfare as we head into the new season.

With the 2022 World Cup being held halfway through the season, some of Europe’s top players face a long season, and Bale believes something needs to change.

‘It’s crazy. I think we were speaking the other day, and someone mentioned on one of the tables at lunch that De Bruyne could play 79 games next season and have a three-week break’

‘It’s too much, I think. Things obviously need to change. I think every player will tell you there’s way too many games, it’s impossible to play at a high level for that amount of games’

‘Something has to change. People at the top of the game have to do something. But unfortunately, money comes into it. They want to make more money and it’s a business at the end of the day’

‘But for player welfare I think money needs to be overlooked and you need to look after the players. Without the players there’s no product’

The Welsh captain hasn’t played many minutes this season, but he’s ready to play against Belgium on Saturday.

‘I feel fine. I don’t just sit at home and do nothing even though I’m not playing that much!’

‘The game Sunday was physically demanding, it’s obviously a bit more difficult for the ones who’ve not played that much’

‘But when you put the Wales shirt on, you give everything you can until you can’t do much more.’

Speaking after the Netherlands game on Wednesday night, Bale spoke about Wales needing to learn the dark arts after conceding a late goal, however, he believes Wales can learn from this mistake.

‘I think everyone needs to sometimes make a tactical foul, especially when there’s seconds left in a game, and you just got back into it’

‘I think someone just needs to take them down, even if you have to take a yellow card, every team does it’

‘It’s just about having that experience of doing it, knowing when to do it and not try to hurt the player or anything. It’s just a tactical foul, stop the danger like other teams do to us’

‘We’ll take that as a positive now, going into the future if we’re 1-1 or 1-0 up we need a tactical foul and we need to do it’

‘We always say we get better when we make mistakes, and we’ll learn from that one and take it into the future.’

Once again Wales will face Belgium on Saturday night, and Bale reflected on his goal in the qualifying campaign for the 2016 European Championships and how that kickstarted this excellent run of momentum.

‘I think it was definitely one of those moments where you kind of need a good result against a bigger team’

‘Don’t get me wrong it was a difficult night, they had a lot of the ball. It’s that belief knowing we can see games out against the big teams, we can compete against the biggest teams’

‘One of the moments you can draw back on and say that was a moment of change.’

Wales’ next match will be at home to Belgium in the Nations League. The match will take place in the Cardiff City Stadium on Saturday, with kick off at 19:45.