Harry Kane has never scored a Premier League goal in August despite featuring in 10 games.
That got me thinking about football greats and whether any struggled at the beginning of campaigns. Then I stumbled across the latest issue of Four Four Two magazine, with Lionel Messi as guest editor where they profiled seven players to have scored 500+ goals for one club.
Messi achieved this feat last season when he scored in the 92nd minute of April’s Bernabeu Clasico. And he’s in good company.
Josef Bican, Jimmy McGrory, Pele, and Fernando Peyroteo are some of the players mentioned but it was Gerd Mullar who jumped from the page. The German legend holds the record for most goals scored (40) in a single Bundesliga season.
Bayern Munich didn’t dominate the league that season as the title race went down to the wire. Schalke, who were trailing Bayern by one point, had to travel to Munich on the final day of the season, where they would lose 5-1. Muller, however, didn’t score that day. But five other Bayern players did as they became Bundesliga champions.
Returning to the point I was making at the beginning of this article, the comparison with England’s Kane is how he had the reputation of a slow starter. During that 1971-72 season, Muller scored 40 goals in 34 matches — a feat no-one can see being matched. Even Bayern’s Lewandowski, renowned by many as the best striker in the world, is some way off, finishing last season with 30, another amazing tally, but still 10 less than 1970’s European Player of the Year.
Kane was the top scorer in the Premier League with 29 goals. The season prior to that — 2015/16 — he won the same award in a bid to silence critics by proving he’s consistent and not a one-season wonder. And, like Muller, he too is renowned for being a slow starter, with a beginning of the season rut being more psychological than anything else. But that’s guesswork and none of us really know why this is the case.
When asked whether Kane is the best centre forward to have played for Tottenham Hotspur, founder of Spurs Blog Cock on Ball, Ben Harris said: "Spurs have had some of the greatest goal-scorers the English game has seen. The ‘one of our own’ chant goes a long way with Spurs fans, and the ‘local boy done done good’ narrative just adds to the swell of good feeling and belonging. The fact his rise has come from nowhere, and literally, no-one saw it coming is truly phenomenal.
“Harry has the potential to be the best. Not only for Spurs but the national side too. Everything he does turns into gold currently. He’s an all-round scorer of goals. Like Shearer, his game isn't based on pace, just great movement, strength and that sixth sense to be in the right place at the right time.”
Whether Kane fulfills that potential at Spurs remains to be seen. It has a lot to do with Daniel Levy and Spurs’ ambition as a football club, but they were quick to fend off interest from Manchester United earlier this summer when Jose Mourinho turned his attention to the England international after Zlatan Ibrahimovic was released.
Kane’s love affair with Spurs buys the club time, but unless his personal ambitions are met, the club would be arrogant to believe he wouldn’t be tempted elsewhere.
“Whatever Harry’s long term future may be, you can mark my words; he will unquestionably be regarded as one of the greatest English strikers… Ever,” Harris concluded.
But there was suggests that Kane would be dropped for former Ajax striker Vincent Janssen, which in hindsight will make Spurs fans laugh, as their much loved England striker went on a goal scoring riot as the season came to a close, pipping Everton’s Romelu Lukaku to the top goalscorer award.
Moreover, Kane’s haul of 29 goals is particularly impressive considering that he had suffered two injuries last season and had only featured in 30 league games. Aged 23, he now has an incredible tally of 78 goals from 113 Premier League matches, therefore, by the end of next season, he should be part of the 100 club.
The London-born striker unquestionably evokes memories of the legendary Muller. Physically, the former West Germany striker didn’t look like a great goalscorer. And yet he was one of the finest players to have laced a pair of boots.
How can two players who look so ungainly score so many goals? It just doesn’t seem to matter, as the ball ends up in the back of the net.
