Harry Kane at Bayern: how a marriage of convenience turned into true love | Bundesliga

As the flight carrying Bayern Munich’s squad and staff glides into the south-western corner of Cyprus in Monday’s early evening, some of their experienced, decorated players might reflect that, until very recently, they never expected to be here as they gaze out of their windows. Their hosts, Pafos, have certainly come a long way to breathe this rarefied air, removing from their path along the way no less a name than Crvena Zvezda, whose vintage team themselves vanquished Bayern in an epic semi-final on their route to becoming European champions back in 1991.

Finding yourself somewhere you didn’t necessarily expect to be is a continued theme from Bayern’s weekend. Yes, they certainly expected their routine 4-0 win over Werder Bremen (a name that, like the boys from Belgrade, has known more glorious incarnations in the past) on Friday night, but for once it felt like it was about the individual achievement rather than the collective one.

With his two goals from the four Harry Kane reached his Bayern century, and in double-quick time. In fact, he reached it faster than any other player in Europe’s top five leagues has reached 100 goals for one club. With Cristiano Ronaldo having reached his Real Madrid ton in 105 games, at exactly the same pace as Erling Haaland did for Manchester City, Kane got there in 104. Some will use this as an opportunity to minimise the England captain’s achievements in Germany, forgetting that for his goals against Bochum or Darmstadt you could easily mention Ronaldo’s feasting on Hércules and Granada or Haaland’s against Luton, Ipswich and Burnley.

Such is the inevitability of Bayern-era Kane that it almost never felt like a question of whether he would hit the mark and take the record against Werder, but at what stage of the evening he would. The answer was halfway through the second half, with the hosts already leading 2-0 and Kane having slotted in an 18th successive successful penalty, when it looked like Luis Díaz would shoot as he slalomed into the area. Whether he passed deliberately or scuffed his shot, no matter; Kane adjusted expertly to gobble up the chance, slotting into the far corner past the impressive and overworked debutant goalkeeper Karl Hein (who is on loan from Arsenal, for an extra level of seasoning).

Yet if there was a recent sense of the unstoppable momentum of this looming record, getting there was a moment for player, teammates and club to all assess that yes, Bayern were buying as close to a sure thing as you could get in the transfer market but no, nobody could have imagined it would go quite this well. The roaring success that is Kane in Munich is about so much more than goals; “it’s how he helps the team with and without the ball,” enthused Joshua Kimmich, who called him “extraordinary”. But it is Kane’s demeanour, his unobtrusive leadership that saw him incorporated into the team council quickly after his arrival in 2023, his patience with Bayern’s burgeoning commercial obligations (such as the weekend’s Oktoberfest traditional visit) and adapting seamlessly to offering his time for fan events that is all part of the package.

Yet for all his calm – much appreciated in an environment which has traditionally been the realm of the brash and dramatic – Kane himself has been taken aback by the Bayern experience. It is no secret that he saw himself as a Premier League lifer, moving up a rung to challenge for the title and eventually eclipse Alan Shearer’s modern top-flight scoring record. Coming to Bayern meant putting that final clause on the backburner to chase the main objective of collective silverware and a consistent presence in the Champions League, the absence of which stopped many publicly daring to frame him in the uber-star bracket with Ronaldo and Lionel Messi.

What Kane perhaps couldn’t have anticipated is how Bayern has changed the way he has looked at himself, his career and his potential legacy. There has always been the assumption that Kane and Bayern was a marriage of convenience and that, at some point, he would head back home to find the 48 goals to make it past Shearer, a sense that has informed recent chatter surrounding the €65m release clause that looms in his Bayern contract.

Speaking in the afterglow on Friday, Kane leaving Bayern seemed a long way off, even though he acknowledged what his long-term ideas had been. “When I came here, I was probably thinking about the [Premier League] record,” he admitted to journalists but if the sheer level of Kane has blown away Bayern and German football, how much the club has suited and fulfilled him has taken him aback as well.

“Since I’ve been here, I’ve enjoyed it so much,” he said. “Just playing at this level, being part of the big nights in the Champions League and being one of the favourites for the Champions League. I don’t just want to focus on individual things but to keep pushing myself and see how far we can go.” Scoring goals is addictive but so is being part of a relentless winning culture. So if this weekend was about the numbers, it was also a reminder that those numbers are just a way of quantifying the glory that Kane and Bayern want and, increasingly, that they appear to want together; Kane also made clear that he is open to discussing an extension to that contract which expires in 2027 and few expected to be extended.

“I think they are happy with me,” the 32-year-old said, “and I’m happy with them.” At the moment, it feels that it’s maybe not about Kane’s 100 goals with Bayern, but his first 100 goals with Bayern.

Talking points

At the other end of the age scale, the next products from the Säbener Strasse academy are shaping up nicely, with two 17-year-olds shining; Lennart Karl, again, in another bright cameo and Wisdom Mike, who made a late debut two days after his birthday. Just to make sure it didn’t all go to their heads, both Karl and Mike were made to turn out for the second team against Würzburger Kickers the following day in the Regionalliga.

Speaking of Bayern academy scholars, Munich native Karim Adeyemi is at last threatening to put his potential into practice on a regular basis, continuing his great start to the season in Borussia Dortmund’s 2-0 win at Mainz which maintained their unbeaten start; he was involved in Daniel Svensson’s opener before scoring the second and his searing pace provoked the last-man foul which saw home goalkeeper Robin Zentner sent off. “I need more games like this,” Adeyemi said afterwards.

Eintracht Frankfurt are still the must-watch team in the division though perhaps a little too much so. They led 5-0 at rock-bottom Borussia Mönchengladbach at half-time and 6-0 27 seconds into the second half, when the skipper Robin Koch headed his second. Then Dino Toppmöller made substitutions with Tuesday’s Champions League trip to Atlético Madrid in mind and it finished 6-4. “What happened shouldn’t happen to us,” raged one of the other scorers, Ansgar Knauff, of their timely wake-up call.

Ahead of their own Champions League action, Bayer Leverkusen snared a timely win at St Pauli, with Ernest Poku’s first goal for the club a winner. But it came at a cost, with this slowly developing side of near-strangers losing the experienced Robert Andrich and Patrik Schick to injury.