His every stride slightly laboured, his every touch just a little clumsier than usual, Harry Kane played 109 minutes of this match as if weighed down by the gravity of Neptune. He did not even make it as far as the shoot-out triumph to which he should have been central, replaced by Ivan Toney as the decisive test beckoned. There was, in all honesty, a case for Gareth Southgate to have terminated his fruitless toil much sooner. In the end, Manuel Akanji had to shoulder-barge him off the pitch and into the dugout for the manager to take the hint.
Five penalty-takers, all of whom scored: this was the only detail that preoccupied England fans as they prepared to drink Dusseldorf dry. But once the euphoria settles, many will start asking what their strangely pedestrian captain is contributing to the cause. Despite his two goals in five games, Kane looks, both with and without the ball, like a half-paced version of his usual commanding tournament self. His pitiful return against Switzerland – zero goals, zero assists, zero dribbles completed, and all while losing possession 10 times – points to a conundrum that Southgate must urgently solve.
Penalties have a time-honoured habit of papering over all that has gone before. The moment that Trent Alexander-Arnold’s fifth and final kick flew past Yann Sommer, the collective amnesia was instant. Bouncing up and down to Gala’s Freed from Desire, England supporters wiped the preceding two hours of ponderous torture from their minds. On the concourses afterwards, there was even the odd refrain of “Southgate you’re the one”, not heard since the zenith of his popularity three years ago. And to think, just a few minutes earlier, they had been loudly protesting against the lateness of his substitutions.
It explained why Southgate refused to allow himself more than the briefest celebration. He has become mindful of the gossamer-thin margin between tub-thumping ecstasy and a merciless post-mortem. Plus, he still has problems to solve, with the attenuation of Kane’s powers the most significant. The first-half struggles were especially alarming: Kane touched the ball only nine times. Granted, this was seven more than he had mustered during the opening 45 minutes against Serbia, but England’s attack looked so toothless around him that former Netherlands manager Guus Hiddink characterised their style as “walking football”.
Each time Bukayo Saka skinned Michel Aebischer to reach the byline, Kane was not even in the penalty area to receive the cutback, trundling forward with all the pace of a wheelbarrow. The spectacle was testing the patience of Alan Shearer, a man with a fair sense of what it takes to be a predatory England No 9, as he described him as “running on empty”. Kane could legitimately claim, with 65 international goals to Shearer’s 30, to have no time for such carping. Except his predecessor’s verdict was true not just of this match, but the entire campaign so far.
Can a country’s all-time record scorer ever be a dead weight? At 39, Cristiano Ronaldo has offered plenty of evidence to support the thesis, with his younger Portugal team-mates reduced to servicing his colossal vanity. While Kane, nine years Ronaldo’s junior, is hardly the hubristic type, the blunting of his threat has hampered England. He should be the virtuoso concert pianist feeding off the orchestra, but it is as if he has decided not even to turn up for his recital.
His fitness continues to be a concern. Kane injured his ankle for Bayern Munich in March and has rarely been the same force since. This time, he insisted there was no underlying issue, explaining that Southgate had taken him off as a precaution after his ungainly extra-time crash into the touchline water bottles, causing him cramp in both calves. He had resembled the walking wounded all evening, initially hurt in a clash of heads with Granit Xhaka before Akanji bundled him off the pitch altogether.
The vexed debate England must confront before their semi-final with the Dutch is whether Kane deserves to start. Besides the article of faith that a captain is essentially undroppable, there is little compelling justification for Kane remaining a protected species. Switzerland’s Breel Embolo was everything he was not here: menacing, alert, attacking the ball at every opportunity. He conveyed only inertia, incapable of winning free-kicks or of moving with any freedom. Toney eclipsed him for impact in the space of just 11 minutes. Can Southgate afford, with such proven poachers as Toney and Ollie Watkins straining at the leash, to keep his trust in a virtually immobile Kane?
It would be unwise to expect any curveballs. Southgate is about as likely to snub the Prince of Wales as he is to dispense with Kane at the sharp end of a European Championship. He can argue that he has heard all the grumbling before: under pressure to sideline Kane after a quiet group phase in 2021, he saw his striker respond with four vital knockout strikes.
This situation feels different, though. As if being booked in the second half were not a sufficient indignity, Kane was withdrawn on the pretext he was exhausted, thus displacing him as England’s first penalty-taker. It was scarcely a mortal blow, with Cole Palmer setting in train the most confident set of spot-kicks the country has ever produced. For Kane, there can have been few sensations more galling. Once the talisman, he is now the onlooker.
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