Gareth Bale simply destroyed Maicon: Harry Redknapp

After beating defending champions Inter Milan, Tottenham Hotspur manager Harry Redknapp tells DNA that his side wants to stay in the European championship as long as possible.

How are you feeling after beating defending champions Inter Milan?
It was a great night all-round - to have played so well against the champions and earn a thoroughly deserved win. It was a fantastic atmosphere at White Hart Lane. The crowd was great and the players were brilliant, every single one of them. It just couldn’t have gone better for us.

Everyone is talking about Gareth Bale…
We saw in the first game what he was capable of against Maicon. If you were picking a World XI side then Maicon would have been in it. He was voted UEFA’s Defender of the Year last year but yet Gareth absolutely destroyed him over the two games. When you can do that to a player rated as highly as Maicon then that shows the kind of performance that Gareth turned in over the two games.

What if somebody comes in and bids say £35million for Gareth?
You couldn’t buy him for that, that’s for sure. If he had a value it would be way in excess of that. He really is an amazing young player. We wouldn’t even entertain a bid. The chairman has said he is not for sale and that is good enough. We are looking to build a team at Tottenham. We are a club that is going places. We have a new training ground coming, hopefully a change in stadiums. We are going forward. If you build a team you have to hang on to the Gareth Bales of this world.

How can you improve this side further?
It is difficult to bring players into our squad because we have so many good players here including many who are not even getting into the team at the moment like Niko Kranjcar, Robbie Keane, Roman Pavlyuchenko. That night Jermaine Jenas started on the bench with Wilson Palacios, Sebastien Bassong. They are all good players who should be playing but the team is playing well. It is a good squad now so if you’re going to bring anybody in, they’ve got to be better than what you’ve got and it is difficult to find that unless they are real top drawer.

Can Spurs go all the way in the Champions League?
I don’t know. I just wanted to get through the knockout stage to start with. We were nearly out against Young Boys after that first half in Switzerland but we managed to pull ourselves out of a real difficult situation and then came back home and won the game comfortably. We just want to get through his group. It is still wide open. Twente are top of the Dutch league and they went to Germany last night and won 2-0 so it is all to play for.

You have transformed this side from bottom of the Premier League to beating the Champions League holders in two years…
I think it is about confidence. We have brought a few players in, while one or two here have got better and grown up. Gareth Bale, when I came here had gone more than 20 games without being on the winning side and he was out of the picture. He wasn’t playing but his confidence now is sky high. Perhaps Luka Modric was not producing what people were hoping he would when he first arrived but now he is a world-class player. I think that is the key and now they’re all enjoying their football. It is a team effort here.

If Tottenham’s name isn’t on the Champions League trophy this season then which other team you would bet on?
They are all good sides but if I had to answer honestly I think the favourites are the two Spanish clubs Real Madrid and Barcelona. But certainly I wouldn’t underestimate Chelsea, Arsenal or Manchester United, they are all good sides and so are Tottenham. We want to stay in as long as we can and enjoy it.