Harry Kane and this club v country debate | OneFootball

Harry Kane has been talking about club versus country.

Born in Walthamstow and a product of Ridgeway Rovers, the community football club that also boasts the likes of David Beckham and Dwight Gayle as former players.

Harry Kane has never won a trophy as a professional footballer, but as England’s record goalscorer, he is the darling of the southern media.

For many Newcastle United fans, their stand-out memory of Harry Kane is that shocking challenge on Florian Lejeune on his Newcastle United debut, when the England striker should have got a red card, but of course didn’t.

Ahead of Thursday night’s England Nation League encounter with Greece, Kane was critical of his fellow professionals who had pulled out of Lee Carsley’s squad.

In criticising those who didn’t report for duty, Harry Kane said he recognised it was a tough period of the season but suggested that this had been taken advantage of, going on to proclaim that “England comes before anything, and any club situation.”

Really?

Lee Carsley has had to cool tensions within the England camp by playing down Kane’s histrionics and by stressing how injuries have given opportunities to those who have been called up as a consequence, Tino Livramento being one of the beneficiaries of course.

I wonder what serial winners like Trent Alexander Arnold and Phil Foden have made of Kane’s insulting comments.

As for the club versus country debate, I think Kane’s views are out of touch and perhaps reflect a southern perspective, although I’m not saying that fans of his former club would necessarily plump for England winning the Nations League over their own team plundering some silverware anytime soon.

For me as a Newcastle United fan, there is no debate.

Would I like to see England win the World Cup? Of course I would. In fact, I still can’t get over how disappointed I felt after the defeat in the European Championships against Italy in 2021 (the loss against Spain was easier to take because I never expected anything other than the Henri Delaunay Trophy ending up in Iberia).

But if England winning major honours was to come at the expense of NUFC winning silverware, that would be a very different question.

Put it this way, I’d rather Newcastle United won the League Cup in March, even if it meant England never winning another trophy in my lifetime, than England winning every World Cup between now and my number coming up.

As for Harry Kane, I can’t deny he’s a fantastic striker, but I think he has a nasty streak on the pitch at times. Something that the southern media never pick up on or call out and he went downhill in my estimation, with that horror tackle on wor Florian back in August 2017.