Harry Kane: Scoring for Scoring's Sake

What are goals for if not in service of objectives?

Helping those who don’t want help is difficult but not impossible. That chance, however slender, leaves many in a bind. Saving time and energy is better than wasting them, but the right thing to do is to help. In that spirit, I’m here for Harry Kane.

Tottenham Hotspur last won a trophy in 2008. Chelsea were on the losing end, so I remember it well. The League Cup final was new Wembley Stadium’s second-ever final. Didier Drogba scored the opener. Dimitar Berbatov responded from the spot. In extra time, Jonathan Woodgate found the winner with help from Petr Čech. Spurs lifted the cup. I was in pain.

A 15-year drought has since fallen upon the white half of north London, yet the reputation of “a club who can’t win” is only accurate within a particular window. Their trophy cabinet isn’t barren. Periods of success exist—most notably in the 1960s and 1970s.

Spurs won the First Division and FA Cup in 1960/61. They backed up their double by retaining the FA Cup in 1962. The following season Tottenham destroyed Atletico Madrid 5-1 in the 1963 Cup Winners' Cup final. The 1966/67 FA Cup soon came, and trophies spilled into the 1970s. League Cups were won in 1971 and 1973. The 1972 UEFA Cup was added to the collection between those domestic titles. By any metric, 11 trophies in 13 seasons (if including Charity Shield honours from 1961, 1962, and 1967) is a successful era.

Joy was felt in the 1980s with Glenn Hoddle and Osvaldo Ardiles, likewise in the early 1990s with Gary Lineker and Paul Gascoigne. It was never a recreation of the 1960s or 1970s, but Tottenham weren’t considered a club where trophies were an impossibility. The concept of Spurs being a desert in which careers wither is relatively new.

There are many apocryphal Samuel Clemens quotes; my favourite from the American humorist is: “History never repeats itself, but it does often rhyme.” I find the aphorism particularly relevant within the context set because Tottenham’s own history provides a great comparison to frame Kane. That being the late Jimmy Greaves.

Initially a Chelsea player, Greaves transferred to AC Milan in June 1961 but found himself back in London six months later. Tottenham signed the 21-year-old in December 1961. From then through 1969/70, his last season at White Hart Lane, Greaves scored 268 times—a club record. The mark has stood for 53 years; Kane passes it with three more goals.

It would be an incredible accomplishment. Individually, it displays skill, footballing intelligence, determination, loyalty, and consistency. These qualities make Kane arguably the best striking talent of his generation. Were that the objective of football, this discussion ends here. Unfortunately, proving your level is a prerequisite. Once established, one’s level allows them access to clubs with specific ambitions. The objective of football is not individuals maximising their talent; it is each club winning trophies or maintaining positions the talent they have—or have access to—demands.

When looking at the 1960s, Greaves’ goals were not merely a manifestation of his exceptional goalscoring prowess, an added gravitas is attached because they served the purpose of what Tottenham in that era were assembled to do: win silverware.

Likewise, contemporary Tottenham are built to win. No fruit has been borne, but each season from the 2014 acquisition of Mauricio Pochettino—through the arrivals of José Mourinho and Antonio Conte—has witnessed increased desperation from chairman Daniel Levy to exploit Kane’s existence before the sands of time exhaust themselves.

Since Pochettino, Spurs have an average Premier League finish of 4.25 (Chelsea have an average finish of 3.88 in the same span with two titles). Tottenham also found themselves in the 2019 Champions League final. These things aren’t happenstance.

Standard with being educated in the United States, my English degree was replete with notions of l'art pour l'art (art for art’s sake). Taken from French literary critic Théophile Gautier, the central thrust is art should not be didactic, if beauty exists in the seemingly unimportant then limiting one’s expression to items or styles grounded in sharing knowledge is ultimately defeating. This idea was consequential because classes could not be passed after a certain point without understanding Romanticism—an artistic theoretical framework grounded in individualism, nature, and emotion.

Romanticism had its strongest hold on Western thought in the 19th century. Gautier’s phrase was paramount in comprehending that zeitgeist and anything which evolved as a continuation (i.e. aestheticism, decadence) or in opposition, most notably Realism. Romantic literature is heavy in horror, suspense, and the supernatural—anything that triggers emotion. Realism is not so much concerned with provoking emotion, rather conveying life as it happens.

This reintroduces Clemens, also known as Mark Twain. Perhaps the most well-known American realist, Clemens made it a point to transmit life as it was. He wrote in vernacular English, using colloquial speech, allowing his readers sight into the lives of everyday people. That commitment leads Clemens’ two seminal works (The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and Adventures of Huckleberry Finn) to be often banned because they contain slurs commonly used in 19th-century America and still today.

The Realist aim of imparting information has always seemed to me the more useful purpose for literature. Not to imply Romantic ideas have no place, but art for art’s sake only works insofar as one is moved. If the attempt to draw emotion fails, you gain nothing. If successful, it is felt and enjoyed at an individual level. Whereas Realism’s core is ensuring the reader gains something. Whether they feel it emotionally is secondary, but it offers a platform to be used in more tangible ways.

[When I learned abstract expressionism (which to me is the ultimate form of art for art’s sake) was sponsored by the Central Intelligence Agency during the Cold War to oppose Realistic art sponsored by socialist and communist governments these things made more sense.]

Hopefully my quick summary of 200-level English hasn’t bored you, but it captures how I conceptualise sports.

On purely aesthetics, what draws me to football is dribbling. Neymar, Ronaldinho, Lionel Messi, and Zinedine Zidane go without saying. Even Jay-Jay Okocha, Hatem Ben Arfa, and Adel Taarabt, players never considered the best in the world but who made it their mission to disrespect the opposition. That will always be my happy place, but the satisfaction is individualistic. If a dribble is not married with contextual functionality, nothing has been accomplished except triggering pleasure in those who enjoy the aesthetic.

Much in the same way, pleasure is derived from goals. They are the lifeblood of football, but goals without the same contextual functionality as dribbling are only useful as moments of release for fans and a means to get paid for players and football clubs. The purpose of goals is winning games, and games exist not just for pleasure but to achieve objectives. This is the paradox Kane presents. Of what use is it to score 319 times for England and Spurs, yet have nothing but individual honours when individual honours aren’t the objective?

Three-hundred and nineteen is effectively scoring for scoring’s sake.

Last week The Athletic’s David Ornstein published a report suggesting the 29-year-old could again commit himself to Tottenham, much to the delight of “the Spurs hierarchy and fanbase.” My thought after reading the report was despair. What more can Kane do than be his club’s all-time scorer? It is a project seemingly incapable of winning despite having a striker whose statistical output is on par with the greatest No. 9s in the game’s history.

Kane’s ambition is commendable. Two summers ago notwithstanding, his willingness to stick is an attitude everyone wants their talisman to replicate, but that disposition harming his career registers as sadness. I’m sympathetic to loving your club and city, even not wanting to disrupt your young family, but from this desk I can’t entirely concern myself with points of lifestyle.

Staying at Spurs chasing individual pursuits—like passing Greaves or Alan Shearer—betrays the talent he’s displayed for nine seasons. Scoring is scoring’s reward; Kane’s authentication now comes by lifting what his goals are designed to achieve. 🎯