What matters in football? What is the game about? Aside, that is, from making enormous sums of money, or even bigger sums if you’re prepared to sell out completely and become the agent of a repressive petrostate. Even if you accept Danny Blanchflower’s dictum that the game is about glory, it’s perhaps not as straightforward as he suggested it was to define what that means.
On Thursday morning, Bayern Munich and Tottenham agreed a deal of £86m plus add-ons for Harry Kane, a remarkable figure for a player entering the final year of his contract. But Kane is a remarkable player, an all-round striker who has scored at least 17 goals in every season since he became a first-team regular in 2014-15. And that consistency is all the more eye-catching because he has done it while playing for Tottenham, a team who in that time have won nothing, who are consistent only in their inconsistency.
Kane is 30 now and, although he’s played in two League Cup finals, a Champions League final and the final of Euro 2020, he has won nothing. If that frustrates him, it would be entirely understandable, particularly now the possibility of being the man who finally inspires Spurs to glory seems so remote. (And this is a consideration that should not be underplayed: Lionel Messi’s triumph at the World Cup last year was as glorious as it was precisely because he had failed to win it four times before. Thomas Müller has won the Bundesliga 12 times; how much glory would there be for him if this season Bayern once again see off all the teams with significantly fewer resources than them and make it 13?)
Does it matter, though, in terms of Kane’s legacy – assuming he even thinks in such a way – that he has never won a trophy? He is 47 behind Alan Shearer’s Premier League goalscoring record (and 144 behind Jimmy Greaves’s all-time top-flight record); at his current output, he would be claiming the Premier League record for himself towards the end of next season or possibly the beginning of the one after. He may get injured or the goals may dry up, but it’s fair to say the probability if he were to stay in England is of Kane becoming the Premier League’s all-time top scorer.
If he does agree personal terms with Bayern and move to Germany, the strong probability is that he will win the Bundesliga. But to an extent, so what? In 20 years will it be better to be remembered as the Premier League’s all-time leading scorer, or as the second top-scorer in Premier League history who won a couple of German titles at the end of his career? Would it matter if Kane, say, reached 300 Premier League goals but won nothing? There would be a certain purity to the achievement, particularly as it couldn’t really be argued that his goals tally is the result of a selfishness that has held his team back; Kane also has 46 assists and the most common criticism of him over his career has been that he drops too deep and should be spending more time in the opposition’s box.
The possibility remains that, with a price now set, other clubs, spared the attrition of negotiating with Levy, may be tempted to make an offer. There may yet be a way for Kane to continue targeting the Premier League record while enhancing his chances of winning a trophy. But even if he doesn’t, even if he does somehow end up staying at Tottenham, does that matter?
There would be those who would condemn him for a supposed lack of ambition but maybe, even if there is frustration at the mess that has been made at Spurs since the 2019 Champions League final, would it be so wrong if he decided he was just happy there? While he did seemingly try to force through a move to Manchester City in 2021, his rebellion was relatively tame, consisting of turning up a couple of days late for a pre-season camp, before training as diligently as ever. Luka Modric or Dimitar Berbatov this was not.
It’s a feature of modern football, reflecting the wider world, that players are supposed constantly to strive to play for the biggest clubs and to make the most money and win the most medals, but if Kane and his family are settled (and given his wife is expecting, that is perhaps an even greater concern), who does it really benefit to uproot everybody and move? Only, it might be argued, his agent – and of course everything might have been different with a pushier or more ruthless agent than Charlie, his brother.
Perhaps Kane goes to Munich, thrives there, becomes an even better player, wins the Champions League with Bayern and inspires England to win the Euros in 2024. Perhaps a change is just what he needs to revitalise him for the final years of his career. But it may equally be that Kane feels comfortable where he is – which is not the same as being complacent. He could go to Bayern, win a couple of doubles and it could all still be underwhelming. Or he could stay in England, somehow miss out on the Premier League record and still find a way for his career to reach a glorious climax.
It’s not always about stats or silverware; success is often no more than a feeling.
