This article is part of Football FanCast’s Opinion series, which provides analysis, insight and opinion on any issue within the beautiful game, from Paul Pogba’s haircuts to League Two relegation battles…
Harry Kane could be set to break even more records at both club and international level.
The England international scored against Kosovo at the weekend as the Three Lions won 4-0, meaning that he became the first player in English football history to score in every single qualifier for an international tournament, this one being Euro 2020.
It also took his tally for his country to 32 goals in 45 caps.
Wayne Rooney, who scored 53 goals in 120 caps, currently holds the all-time scoring record.
Football FanCast has crunched the numbers, both at national and club level, and one has to feel that Kane can break both the national team record and the Premier League one held by Alan Shearer, who hit 260 goals during his time in the top-flight.
As it is, Kane has scored a goal every 0.7 games at international level. He needs 22 more goals to pass Rooney’s record, meaning he needs to win roughly 32 more caps.
That would take him to 77 – more than achievable for a player who is currently the captain of Gareth Southgate’s side.
Indeed, in his last 11 caps, Kane has scored 13 goals. If he were to keep up that record, he would break the record within his next 21 appearances for England, meaning he would be their all-time goalscorer after just 63 outings.
At Premier League level, the hill is higher and harder to climb.
Thus far, the 6 foot 2 striker has scored 131 Premier League goals and is 13th in the list of the league’s all-time top scorers.
He has averaged 18.7 goals per season so, if we round that up to 19, we can get a clear picture of how long it will take the Spurs striker to break Shearer’s long-standing record.
Now, it must be said, that Kane could well leave for a club like Real Madrid or PSG but let’s assume that he stays in north London or joins a rival Premier League club like Manchester United or Man City.
If he continues at his current rate of scoring and hits 19 in every single season, it will take him until the 2025/26 season, when Kane is 32, to break Shearer’s record. At that rate, he would reach 264 goals by the end of 25/26. A 19-goal season in 2019/20 would take his tally to 150, equal with ex-Liverpool star Michael Owen.
Yet there is hope that it could be reached quicker.
Kane’s zenith came in 2017/18, when he hit 30 goals. Now, if he were to score 30 goals in every season hereafter, he would smash Shearer’s record by 2023/24.
The amazing thing about these numbers is that they are achievable for Kane.
He is a goalscorer, first and foremost, and has proved that he can hit the net with regularity in a variety of different Spurs and England teams.
The stats point to the realisation that Kane could well become both the best goalscorer England have ever had and also the best goalscorer the Premier League has ever seen.
It would be quite a career for a player who spent 2011 on loan with Leyton Orient.
