He’s the one-season wonder who captains England, is breaking goalscoring records and is rightfully discussed in the same breath as the best players on the planet. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But in the modern world of trial by statistic Kane offers so much more and in one facet of his game he is by far the best on the planet. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Historically in the days of the big, burly traditional number nine it would be called ‘hold-up play’ but that phrase is almost an injustice to what Kane does, and what he offers the teams he plays in when isolated on a football pitch. Nobody on the planet, not Messi, Ronaldo, Aguero or Lewandowski come even close to him. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
A combination of an incredible work ethic, strength, touch under pressure, lay-offs, passing or even the ability to draw a foul is unsurpassed. Playing against lesser opposition which most top strikers do all the time it’s almost a lost and unnecessary art in the days of tiki-taka possession based football but when top teams meet each other and come under pressure to have a Kane is absolutely invaluable. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Watching Spurs week in week out you lose count of the amount of times he defies the odds to get on the end of an imperfect ball, battle off two or three defenders and retain possession and it’s something that the crowd at the game appreciate but perhaps football fans interested in shots on targets, xG or any of these quite often meaningless modern stats can often ignore. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I know we’re in an age where players are flavour of the month dependent on haircuts, form or FIFA stats but this is just a shout-out to a player of Kane’s ability who could walk round the pitch and still get picked. He doesn’t. He does the dirty work and does it beautifully and any manager on the planet would be lucky to have him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"