Has Kane really evolved his game or have Spurs changed? The two real reasons for his remarkable form
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Updated 29/11/2020 at 15:53 GMT
Harry Kane hasn’t evolved his game with age. He hasn’t added creativity or the ability to drop deep. The reasons for Kane’s remarkable assist and chance creation ratio are more to do with circumstances of 2020 and how Tottenham are using him differently than a development of the player himself.
Tottenham Hostpur and England striker Harry Kane
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The conversation around Harry Kane’s remarkable start to the season has taken on a familiar form. First the stats will be rolled out, and then it will be remarked that he has changed his game, added a new string to his bow.
“Harry Kane has evolved”; “He’s added assists to his game”; “He’s adapting with age”; and so on and so on...
It’s an easy conclusion to come to if you look at the figures. Never before in his career has Kane created so many chances and laid on so many assists.
Nine assists and seven goals in nine Premier League matches in an extraordinary record. It puts him in the top five for highest scorers this season and has him way out in-front in the assists charts, while he’s also top of all variants of chance creation statistics you can find.
So yes, it’s understandable why you would say he’s added something his game.
But that is wide of the mark. There are two main reasons why Kane’s stats are changing.
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Harry Kane leads a train of Tottenham players in the warm-up
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How he’s used at Tottenham
When Kane first broke through at Tottenham his coaches saw him as more of a number ten than an out-and-out striker. Both Andre Villas-Boas and then Tim Sherwood liked the option of using the young forward playing off a striker on occasion, but it soon became apparent he could do both and he was of greater use in the Spurs squad as an out-and-out number nine.
Throughout the past six seasons Kane's passing range and ability to pull the strings when dropping into midfield have always been there and in truth have been a largely underappreciated part of his game. He has always been able to play this way, but it wasn’t as effective because of the way Spurs were set up.
Mauricio Pochettino almost never picked two wide forwards, meaning Kane was only ever likely to have one player making runs in behind when he dropped deep, rather than the two we see this season.
When only Heung-Min Son is making runs then it’s easier for opposition defences to control, but Jose Mourinho is using two such players, with Lucas Moura, Gareth Bale or Steven Bergwijn making similar runs from the other flank, opening up more space and offering Kane greater options.
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Jose Mourinho, Manager of Tottenham Hotspur interrupts Son Heung-Min of Tottenham Hotspur speaking to the media to tell him Harry Kane of Tottenham Hotspur received man of the match during the Premier League match between Southampton and Tottenham Hotspur
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It’s the same tactic that Gareth Southgate has used over recent years with England. Kane’s performance in the 3-2 win over Spain, dropping deep and looking to play in Raheem Sterling and Marcus Rashford, is exactly how he’s been playing this season. But that match was over two years ago now, further proof that Kane has not changed, it’s the team around him that has.
This isn’t necessarily a criticism of Pochettino either. The Argentine enjoyed great success with his tactic of having one forward player tucking in and adding numbers to midfield to act as a second playmaker, usually Dele Alli or Christian Eriksen. And Kane’s goal tally during Pochettino’s tenure suggests it wasn’t a bad style for him either.
But what it did mean was that he could become a bit toothless when he dropped into midfield, and that string to his bow was underutilised.
Look at the 2019 Champions League Final as an example of this rigidity from Pochettino. Kane starting instead of Lucas was one of the talking points of the game. Starting both wasn’t seen as an option. But if Mourinho had been manager then it would have been Dele Alli who was sacrificed, with Lucas and Son either side of Kane.
Rest and recuperation
The other big factor behind Harry Kane’s phenomenal current form is a simple one: He’s had some time off.
There haven’t been many positives to take from the coronavirus pandemic, but for Kane it gave him an extremely rare opportunity to get some rest. Combined with the injury he picked up at the start of the year, the pandemic lay-off meant Kane didn’t play football for the best part of six months. That’s by far the biggest break he’s had in his career.
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LONDON, ENGLAND - OCTOBER 11: Harry Kane of England during the UEFA Nations League group stage match between England and Belgium at Wembley Stadium on October 11, 2020 in London, United Kingdom. Football Stadiums around Europe remain empty due to the Coro
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In fact, Kane has barely taken a breather in six years. He’s played 90 minutes in virtually every game in the league and Europe for Spurs when fit, and the absence of any sort of back-up striker until the arrival of Vinicius this summer means he’s also played the vast majority of cup games during that period too.
Kane has also played for England in all four summers prior to 2020, with great success it must be added. But despite winning the Golden Boot at the World Cup in 2018, it was quite clear that he was dead on his feet by the time England reached the semi-finals, an exhausted shell of the player he is capable of being.
In August he returned to action both fully fit and full rested for the first time in six years. It’s remarkable what some freshness will do.
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