Chris Sutton has responded to Harry Kane’s suggestion that his stats be inflated, saying he is “not in charge of scheduling” and “can’t help with who he plays.”
Kane is currently one of the most in-form players in world club football. He has already scored 18 goals and provided three assists for Bayern Munich this season.
He also has a great record as an England representative. The Three Lions captain has scored seven goals in his last eight games for his country.
However, Senegal was the only team he played against in the top 20 of the FIFA rankings during that period.
England’s record scorer, with 74 goals in 109 games, has often been attacked with claims of hitting the stat pad against lower-ranked teams, but Sutton hit back at them for him.
Speaking to BBC Sport, he said: “If Harry Kane announced his retirement from international football today, we would immediately look at England and their chances at next year’s World Cup in a completely different light.
“Kane may not be in the England squad for long, but who will replace him? Who’s close to his level? No one. That says all you need to know. As an all-rounder and a ruthless goalscorer, there aren’t many better players in England.”
“People talk about scoring goals in qualifying, but he’s not the match secretary, right? He can’t help who he plays against. He’s a goal-scoring machine and that’s been his whole career. When you talk about the best English strikers of all time, he needs to be in that conversation. Look at his numbers.”
During his career with England, Kane scored against big teams such as Germany, France, Nigeria, Croatia, Denmark, Netherlands and Italy.
He has scored 44 goals in European Championship or World Cup qualifiers, some against lesser teams and certainly some against stronger teams.
In tournament football itself, Kane has scored 15 goals, including goals in two Euro semi-finals, the World Cup quarter-finals, and multiple stages of the tournament leading up to them.
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Sutton added:
“If people don’t give him the credit he deserves, it might be because he’s been England’s main player for a long time. Sometimes people are there to try to cut you down.
“English players are judged at major tournaments and criticized if they don’t win, but usually a high-profile captain leads the charge.
“There may be rivalries, there may be tribalism, there may be social media, and some people will resent that, but I don’t think anyone who has played the game to a certain level would question him. And I think most fair-minded supporters recognize the kind of player Harry Kane is.”
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