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During his managerial career, Mauricio Pochettino has had the good fortune to work with some of his era’s greatest attacking talents.
The Argentine’s time at Paris Saint-Germain saw him manage the likes of Neymar, Kylian Mbappe and his compatriot Lionel Messi, but in terms of goals scored under Pochettino, none of that trio came close to Harry Kane.
The England skipper plundered 169 goals for Tottenham during Pochettino’s spell in charge of the north London side, a stint that convinced him that Kane belongs among the modern greats of the game.
Pochettino on Kane’s place in the modern game
Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo are the starting point for any debate on the best players of the past 20 years, but does Pochettino believe Kane should be a part of that conversation?
“That’s saying a lot,” Pochettino tells FourFourTwo, as he acknowledges the standards set by the pair who have won 13 Ballons d’Or between them since 2008.
But Pochettino is quick to mitigate this comparison by pointing out the fact that Kane has not enjoyed the limelight that playing for teams that win trophies virtually every season brings.
“He didn’t have the fortune of being at a club where he won a lot of trophies,” he continues. “If that had been the case, people would be talking about him much more.”
Kane’s loyalty to Tottenham saw him spend 13 years at the club, with just runners-up medals from the Champions League and two League Cups to show for it.
In the summer of 2023 he made a €100million move to Bayern Munich, where he last season won his first league title at the age of 31. A second has followed this year, but Pochettino believes Kane to be one of many players not to have won the honours that their talent deserves.
“His CV doesn’t fully reflect his quality, but there are players with many titles that don’t necessarily match their individual talent.
“And truly great coaches who haven’t won as much as they deserved,” Pochettino continued, speaking from his own experience after guiding Tottenham to the Champions League final in 2019, where they were defeated by Liverpool.
“Measuring him solely by trophies is a little unfair.”
