‘Is he a nice guy? No. He’s a good guy’: how Harry Kane became an England great

Figures who worked with striker in his formative years recall a self-belief – even when his talent did not stand out

There is another version of reality in which Harry Kane is not England’s greatest goalscorer but a goalkeeper. On his first day at Ridgeway Rovers, his first club, the coach Dave Bricknell asked whether anyone fancied going in goal. A six-year-old Kane threw up his hand – and he was pretty good.

“I thought I’d found a goalkeeper,” Bricknell says. “At that age, you don’t get many kids that don’t mind standing in front of a ball.”