VIDEO: Wright, Ferdinand and King on Gareth Bale

At a promotional event in central London on Thursday, four Arsenal and Tottenham Hotspur greats shared their views on transfer speculation surrounding Spurs attacking midfielder Gareth Bale.

The Welsh star is tipped to complete a move to Real Madrid ahead of Monday night’s transfer deadline and all were impressed with the progress which Bale has made in his career.

It has to be up there with the longest transfer sagas in Tottenham Hotspur history, even putting the Leandro Damiao transfer talk to shame.

Ian Wright, former Arsenal and England striker: “Fantastic player. Fantastic player. It is getting into ridiculous sums of money, if we going to be totally honest and I feel that when you look at Cristiano Ronaldo and what he has done for an 80 million pound player, we said the same thing before that, before he went there. But if you can say that someone has justified their pricetag, scoring more than a goal a game at a club like Real Madrid is unbelievable. So if Gareth Bale is going to cost 20 million pounds more than him, what are we expecting from him (Bale). It seems ridiculous, really.”

Les Ferdinand, former Tottenham Hotspur and England striker: “I think he is fantastic and I think he is getting better all the time. You know, four years ago we wouldn’t be standing here thinking about Gareth Bale being the world record, you know, a world record bid coming in for Gareth Bale. So it just shows you how quickly football can change at times. And over those four years I think he has improved immensely and you know, he is one of the most exciting players in the world at the moment.”

Ledley King, former Tottenham Hotspur and England central defender: (On his experience of playing and training with Bale at Tottenham) “Oh yeah, he is a top lad. Very quiet, down to earth guy. Hard worker. Great athlete – that is one of the things that struck me when he first come was his athletic ability as well as a wonderful left foot. He had everything there to be one of the best wingers, I thought, at the time. But he has adapted his game even further than I thought. A bit similar to how Ronaldo did and he has become, for sure, one of the best around.”

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