“And then we were punished”
Harry Kane sends out alarm signals after a “tough week”.
February 16, 2024, 8:42 a.m
FC Bayern Munich is threatened with its first titleless season in twelve years. And Harry Kane, the super striker, may have to continue desperately chasing his first ever title. A “hard week” shakes everything up.
Harry Kane is a goal machine: the striker scored 213 goals in 320 games in the Premier League, and the 30-year-old scored an incredible 24 times in the first 20 games of his young Bundesliga career. For a long time it seemed almost inevitable that the Briton would break Robert Lewandowski’s Bundesliga record. But that’s a thing of the past: In the record champions’ last two games – the depressing 0-3 in the Bundesliga against Bayer Leverkusen and the difficult to explain 0-1 in the Champions League against Lazio Rome – the goalscorer didn’t even shoot on goal. “It’s been a really tough week,” Kane told TNT Sports after the defeat in Italy’s capital.
The unsettled record champions showed a good first half against Lazio Rome, “we had some clear chances, I had one myself, Jamal Musiala had one, and in these games they are big moments and we were not in a position to take advantage of them.” . Then came the second half, in which we “completely lost track,” as teammate Thomas Müller put it. Or as the hapless Kane describes it: “We came out of the dressing room with less energy and self-confidence, gave away too many balls and were ultimately punished.”
After the disastrous cup exit at the end of October at the third division club 1. FC Saarbrücken, in view of the five points gap to Bundesliga leaders Bayer Leverkusen and the not exactly overwhelming burden before the second leg against Lazio Rome, a horror scenario manifests itself at FC Bayern: the first without a title season for twelve years. The pressure on the stumbling star ensemble and its coach Thomas Tuchel is growing with every minute. Kane made it clear that a change of coach was not an option. “No!”, the attacker countered the corresponding question. “We focus on helping everyone. The coach is part of the team.”
Will the Kane curse continue?
They brought Harry Kane from Tottenham for around 100 million euros after the shaky 2022/23 season, in which they “at least” managed to win the championship title in the last seconds of the season. In order to be able to compete for the really big titles again. “We are proud that he chose us,” said Bayern CEO Jan-Christian Dreesen when Kane was introduced in August. “This shows that he believes we can win titles and be internationally competitive.”
And Harry Kane went to FC Bayern to win a title at all: despite all his many, many goals, the super striker was never able to lift a trophy in his long professional career. No championship, no cup win, nothing. Harry Kane wants to change that – and promises to turn his team’s sporting fortunes around: “I think we have to find ourselves now. We have to find back to more energy and more self-confidence,” said Kane. “We are still in the race for the Bundesliga, so we have to keep fighting and look forward and try to turn our momentum around.”