Are Tottenham Over-reliant On This England International?

On Saturday evening, Spurs secured their 2nd win in 11 games across all competitions in an emphatic style, putting 5 un replied goals past Swansea to further compound the miseries of the Welsh team.

With Lukasz Fabianski looking ready to frustrate the hosts with his logic-dying saves, it took a while for the goals to start coming in. But it was Harry Kane who opened the scoring from the spot in the 39th minute. And the floodgates were opened afterwards.

His goal was quickly followed by Son’s bicycle-volley, and 3 more goals, including another Kane’s strike and Eriksen’s double saw off the visitors during a one-sided 2nd half. While 3 of Tottenham’s forwards might have found the back of the net against the Swans, it was Kane who caught the headlines again.

6 of all the 23-year-old’s 8 attempted shots hit the target, and it’s the only time any player has had as many shots on target in a single Premier League match this season, highlighting the accuracy of the England international in front of goal.

Kane has now scored 7 league goals in 9 league appearances, meaning he has been responsible for 30% of all Tottenham’s 24 goals thus far. Suffice to say Tottenham’s overdependency on their striker has continued this season again.

Last season, Kane scored 25 of all Tottenham’s 69 league goals (36%) as they emerged 3rd at the end behind Arsenal and Leicester City. In the 2014-15 season, the striker was responsible for also 36% of Spurs league goals, as a result of scoring 21 strikes out of the club’s total of 58.

In the 5 league games he missed to injury this term, Spurs won 2 and drew the other 3, while they have won 5, lost once and drawn 3 with him leading their attack.

Tottenham managed to score 6 goals in his absence, averaging 1.2 goals per game, and their win ratio is just 40% compared to when they have had him leading the line, averaging 2 goals per game and recording 55% win ratio.

Tottenham’s formation of deploying a sole striker seems to only favour them whenever their star forward is in fine shape and form, and more importantly when they are able to supply him and get him involved in all the action.

An isolated Kane often cuts a frustrated figure upfront without the services of his teammates to support him, while there seems no other attacking player who is able to constantly supply the goals in his absence, or at least contribute a decent goal return even with Kane around.

Son’s inconsistency betrays his quality, and Eriksen has only found his lost form of recent having notched his 3rd of the season against Swansea. Pochettino deemed it necessary to bring in a backup and quality cover for his number 9 during the summer, and that was the right thing to do.

However, his signing is yet to get a league goal from open play this term despite having almost 600 minutes of EPL action under his belt since arriving. Vincent Janssen has so far struggled to replicate the form that saw him bag 27 Eredivisie goals for AZ.

Without Harry Kane, Tottenham have proved to be average in the final third and have also lacked the killer instinct the young lethal striker brings to the table.

As evident in the past 2 seasons, him alone isn’t able to lead the team to unprecedented success, and if the north London side are to have a clear shot at the title, or even finish in top 4 in this competitive campaign, the overreliance on Kane must stop.