It has taken a lot longer than many initially expected, but the day has eventually arrived now that Harry Kane has officially asked to leave Tottenham Hotspur. The 27-year-old has seemingly run out of patience with Spurs after another season has gone by without silverware. Furthermore, Spurs won’t be playing in the Champions League for the second season in a row, and for a player of Kane’s extraordinary ability, that simply won’t do. He has already won three Golden Boots, but doesn’t have a title to show for his efforts.
With Kane approaching the point of his career when he is statistically meant to be at his most productive, it does feel like there is a very real danger, if he doesn’t move on, of spending that time at a meandering Spurs. the team look as far away from winning a trophy as any team in the bottom half of the Premier League does. Indeed, the England captain knows his legacy in the game is on the line, but where will he end up if he is allowed to leave? Chelsea were one of the first clubs to make contact with Kane’s representatives after the news broke that he wanted a fresh challenge away from north London, but could west London be a bit too close to home still?
Chelsea were not alone when they enquired about Kane’s availability, Manchester City and Manchester United were the other clubs that asked CK 66, the striker’s management firm, to keep them in the loop as far as any developments go. It is understood that Kane’s destination of choice is Manchester City, with the prospect of a move to Stamford Bridge being the least desirable to the 27-year-old. In fact, the one and, almost certainly, only thing that Kane & Spurs Chairman Daniel Levy can agree on is that they both aren’t taken by a move to southwest London.
As far as Levy is concerned, he is determined to hang onto Kane given how little spending power the biggest teams have after a season that saw every club in the world take a monumental financial hit. Basically, if the 59-year-old were to agree to Kane’s departure, Spurs wouldn’t receive anything close to what they had hoped to get for their star man when the day did inevitably come for him to leave.
Spurs had hoped for £150 million but are likely to only receive around £120 million for Kane in the summer of 2021. This is where it gets quite interesting though because, in addition to that, it is believed that Levy is expected to add on £50 million to Kane’s asking price if he ends up going to Chelsea. You now all of a sudden have a situation where Levy would perhaps accept £170 million for his most prized asset at Spurs. Make no mistake, that is a figure that Chelsea have, irrespective of the current financial climate, and would be willing to spend in order to acquire arguably the best center-forward in the world. As initially mentioned, this is a transfer saga that could begin to get quite riveting very quickly.
But what would Chelsea look like with Harry Kane leading the line? The answer has to be frightening.
The Blues managed to get to an FA Cup and Champions League final without really having a center-forward they could rely on. Timo Werner’s arrival from RB Leipzig for a fee of around £50 million would have made Chelsea’s woes in front of goal all the more galling for the club’s board. Punters just need to take a look at this Werner miss against West Ham, found here on soccer-blogger.com to understand how disappointing the German has been this season, and perhaps how keen the hierarchy at Stamford Bridge may be to offload the 25-year-old already.
Now that Kane has come on the market, there appears to be an oven-ready solution.
Although it feels quite inexcusable to liken Kane to a soul-sapping and underwhelming supermarket oven-ready chicken, when the reality is that Kane is more of a duck confit you would find in an upmarket restaurant on a leafy street in Paris. But the point stands, he would fit right into Thomas Tuchel’s side and, in all likelihood, make the Blues champions of England in the not too distant future. In fact, if Kane were to make Stamford Bridge his new home, one could say with some certainty that an extended period of dominance would in all probability follow, which would, of course, be a rarity in the English game.
As asiabet.org alludes to here, the Premier League tends to be very competitive. Indeed, when betting on the outright market, punters very seldomly have to worry about runaway winners unlike many European leagues, which are repeatedly won by the same team. But that could change if Kane ends up wearing the blue of Chelsea or even the sky blue of City.
There are naturally many moving parts to this transfer and a long way to go before the end is in sight.
But the consequences of Harry Kane ending his 17-year affiliation with Tottenham will be far-reaching and could usher in a new dawn of dominance in the Premier League.