Tottenham boss Andre Villas-Boas admits that qualifying for the Champions League is a necessity to keep Gareth Bale at the North London club.

Gareth Bale is on the most highly regarded wingers in Europe at the moment and Real Madrid are top of the list of clubs who want to sign him. He has scored 13 goals already this season and he is in the best form of his career. The Welsh winger has previously expressed admiration for the Spanish club but he signed a fresh contract with Tottenham in the summer, ending speculation then that he would leave.

And if Tottenham achieve Champions League football, AVB believes they can hang onto the club's star player.

"It's difficult for us to have a player of this dimension playing so well, calling the attention of other teams," Villa-Boas told the The Guardian.

"I think we can reach our objectives with him at this level and if we reach our objectives, we can hopefully continue to have Gareth in our club. He's a player we rate very, very highly and aren't willing to let go.

"The Champions League is where most of the clubs want to be, and where most of the players want to play."

AVB has been playing Bale in a central striker role and will be continuing that on Saturday against Newcastle as Adebayor hasn't made it back from the AFCON in time for today's training session and Defoe is still out injured with ankle ligament damage. The Portuguese expects Defoe to be out for between two and four weeks which might be optimistic as the striker still has his foot in a protective boot.

Villas-Boas also took a moment to talk about Gareth Bale in comparison to Real Madrid star Cristiano Ronaldo, telling the press that the two aren't too far apart in ability.

"Both of them are extremely technical players, extremely powerful and pacy. It is funny to see how, in some way, they compare," he added.

"Gareth started at left-back and moved to a winger position...now going to a more advanced role, Ronaldo is also able to play that role up front. Ronaldo is now 28, he has achieved so much and he is an example to what Gareth wants to achieve in his career."

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