Harry Kane flew to Bayern

One of the main transitions in the current transfer window took place last Saturday. Bayern still managed to acquire the famous English scorer Harry Kane from Tottenham, who should be a replacement for Robert Lewandowski, who left last year for Barcelona, ​​without sparing for him a record amount for German football of more than € 100 million. The need for an elite-level center forward in the Munich squad was only confirmed by Saturday’s Super Bowl match. In it, Bayern, having released a newcomer as a substitute in the second half, lost – 0:3 – to Leipzig.

Bayern’s statement about the transfer of Harry Kane turned into the main news for European football last weekend. It turned out to be the result of, apparently, extremely complex negotiations. The arrival of the famous English striker, who spent almost his entire professional career that began in 2009 in London’s Tottenham and is now the captain of his national team, was announced by his honorary president Uli Hoeness to the Munich club back in mid-July. However, over the next month in the British and German media resources, information constantly appeared about the difficulties and disagreements arising in the process of processing the transfer. But in the end, everything ended well for Bayern, and Kane signed a four-year contract with her. And Munich President Herbert Heiner, commenting on the deal, called it “multi-carat”.

The deal is indeed special for German football, at least on a formal basis. She is the most expensive in her history. The clubs representing Germany, including the flagship club, have always distinguished themselves against the backdrop of the giants from England, Spain and France in terms of economy. But in this case, Bayern forgot about it. Without exception, all publications claim that the base cost of the transfer is €100 million. This is immediately €20 million more than the previous, record-breaking purchase in the history of the German championship. It was carried out in 2019 by the same Bayern, having acquired the Frenchman Luc Hernandez from the Spanish Atlético. But in reality, taking into account bonuses, the amount of compensation to Tottenham for Kane, according to Bild, could be even more – up to € 120 million. Kane’s salary at Bayern will also be very solid by German standards – about € 25 million per year, if believe German sources.

The sporting meaning of the transfer for both sides is quite obvious. Thanks to him, Harry Kane got the opportunity to play in the Champions League in the starting season. “Tottenham”, having extremely unsuccessfully spent the previous championship of England and taking eighth place in it, unlike Bayern, who had obtained another gold of their championship, was left without the most prestigious European Cup.

As for the Munich club, it needed to fill a noticeable gap in the application that arose in the summer of 2022. Then he broke up with his leading center forward Robert Lewandowski, who wanted to play for Barcelona at a veteran age. The club has not found an adequate replacement in terms of productivity for the phenomenal Polish sniper. In the last German championship, Bayern’s top scorer with a rather modest 14 goals was Serge Gnabry, a striker who is accustomed to acting more from the depths than at the edge of the attack. For the team itself, the season turned out to be not too expressive. This time, she won the title of champion of Germany by a miracle, bypassing Borussia Dortmund on the flag, and in the quarter-finals of the Champions League she had no chance against Manchester City.

Harry Kane, who turned 30 in July, was in excellent shape, which did not match the tone of his team at all. In the English championship, he has 30 goals. In the goalscoring race, Kane was second only to Erling Haaland of Manchester City.

The very first official match of Bayern this season only confirmed the expediency of her high-profile transfer. In the match for the German Super Cup, she met with Leipzig, which suffered huge personnel losses in the offseason, having lost a number of leaders – Joshko Guardiola, Christopher Nkunku, Dominik Soboslai, Konrad Laimer. However, the Leipzigians, who were quoted much lower than their rivals, were able to defeat Bayern with a score of 3: 0, which, out of desperation, released Harry Kane, who had just arrived in Germany, in the middle of the field. However, he did not manage to prove himself. And after the end of the match, Munich head coach Thomas Tuchel suggested that the newcomer may have been shocked by the form of his team, thinking that “they simply did not train for four weeks.”

Alexey Dospekhov