Even the most partisan of football fans must feel some sympathy for Harry Kane at the moment. It seems the former Tottenham striker simply cannot catch a break.
The 30-year-old has been decorated with individual honors throughout his career, but the big awards have evaded him. Having made the decision to leave Tottenham for Bayern Munich last summer though, surely his trophy drought would be coming to an end? After all, Bayern has been virtually nailed on for the Bundesliga every year for the past decade.
But, such is Kane’s luck, he appears to have joined the club right when a new power is emerging. Bayer Leverkusen has taken the league by storm under Xabi Alonso, building an eight-point lead while remaining unbeaten.
Meanwhile, things are far from rosy in Bavaria. Bayern lost its third game in a row on Sunday, a situation that is usually unthinkable, and although it’s not out of the running for either the Bundesliga or Champions League, it currently seems a mile off claiming any silverware this season.
Kane must be wondering just what he’s done to upset the football gods. His move to Bayern made absolutely perfect sense, and yet he still finds himself the subject of ridicule on social media, even leading to some suggestions he might be ‘cursed’ as he faces up to yet another year without a winner’s medal in his cabinet.
Things wouldn’t have been any different of course had he stayed put at Spurs. And yet, the recurring debate when his future was up in the air was whether he should chase the trophies with Bayern, or achieve the individual honor of becoming the Premier League’s top scorer of all time. Whatever anyone tells you, he made the right call.
Kane will go down as one of the greatest strikers of all time. He would have comfortably overtaken Alan Shearer had he stayed in the Premier League, and he overtook Wayne Rooney in no time at all to become England’s leading scorer. He’s carried his form over to Germany, where he can rightly claim to be on par, if not even better than his predecessor Robert Lewandowski.
But to achieve football immortality, every player knows they need the titles to go with the goals. Sitting 59 goals back, Mohamed Salah is unlikely to overtake Kane in the goalscoring charts unless he extends his stay at Liverpool and maintains his prolific form, but the Egyptian will no doubt be much more satisfied with his career so far.