{"id":409640,"date":"2025-09-09T05:29:14","date_gmt":"2025-09-09T05:29:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/409640\/"},"modified":"2025-09-09T05:29:14","modified_gmt":"2025-09-09T05:29:14","slug":"kane-hopes-england-can-show-best-version-of-ourselves-in-serbia-test-england","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/409640\/","title":{"rendered":"Kane hopes England can show \u2018best version of ourselves\u2019 in Serbia test | England"},"content":{"rendered":"

Harry Kane has played before at the Red Star Stadium in Belgrade. It was with his former club Tottenham in 2019<\/a> and it is for good reason that the England captain lists it among his top three most intimidating away venues. The others, for the record, are Marseille\u2019s V\u00e9lodrome and Galatasaray\u2019s Rams Park.<\/p>\n

Kane went to the former with Spurs in 2022<\/a> and it did not matter that the Virage Nord was closed after incidents involving the Marseille support. He sampled the ear-splitting whistles of the latter with his current club, Bayern Munich, in 2023. Red Star\u2019s ground is called the Rajko Mitic Stadium these days but the basic malevolence has not changed.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just the walk from the changing room to the pitch \u2013 it feels like a mile long,\u201d Kane said. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of fans, you hear a lot of noise, a lot of banging. So, yeah, it was pretty hostile.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kane returns with England<\/a> for the World Cup qualifier against Serbia on Tuesday night and it promises to be a frenzied occasion, even if almost 15% of the stadium will be empty on Fifa orders. The governing body has doled out the punishment after the discriminatory behaviour of Serbia\u2019s fans against Andorra in June.<\/p>\n

The pressure will come not only from the hardliners in the home seats but from those in the visiting enclosure and many more on sofas up and down England. Because this is a tie that has the trappings of a moment of truth.<\/p>\n

It will be incumbent on Kane to lead from the front, helping the less experienced players around him. Dan Burn, Myles Lewis\u2011Skelly, Elliot Anderson and Noni Madueke have no reference points for a crunch England fixture. It is certainly a blow that injuries have ruled out John Stones, Jude Bellingham and Bukayo Saka, among others. Above all, though, it is Thomas Tuchel<\/a> who will feel the burn.<\/p>\n

It is only camp No 3 for the manager but, as he is acutely aware, the time is tight and, thus far, it has all been pretty underwhelming. The wins have come, apart from in the friendly defeat by Senegal<\/a> at the City Ground \u2013 it has been four out of four in qualification Group K, with no goals conceded. Yet there is a sense of Tuchel feeling various pennies drop; of him groping for the answers.<\/p>\n

Before the 2-0 victory against Andorra<\/a> at Villa Park on Saturday, Tuchel talked about trying to simplify his approach and messaging to the players. Perhaps this is not a job for a detail freak. Tuchel, of course, is a detail freak. Afterwards he suggested he may be open to becoming even more unreconstructed further down the line, using long throws and high balls up from the back. Is this him?<\/p>\n

Tuchel wanted to try Stones in the No 6 role against Serbia<\/a>, which would have been interesting. What it also showed is how he worries that he does not have a specialist for the position. Tuchel does not want Kane to drop too deep from the No 9 spot. Yet when he did not on Saturday, he had only 12 touches. The goalkeeper, Jordan Pickford, had 24. What of Marcus Rashford on the left wing? Tuchel has shown incredible trust in him. It has not yet been repaid.<\/p>\n

Harry Kane (right) played for Tottenham in a Champions League win against Crvena Zvezda in Belgrade six years ago. Photograph: Andrej Isakovi\u0107\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

There is the theory that Tuchel has been in a no-win situation in his opening qualifiers, especially the two against Andorra, which followed those against Albania and Latvia at Wembley. Low block tedium, no spaces to impress; victories simply presumed. Kane appeared to warm to the theme. \u201cLook at the other day,\u201d he said. \u201cYou win 2-0, it\u2019s not enough. You win 5-0, it\u2019s only Andorra. It\u2019s almost a lose-lose.\u201d<\/p>\n

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So, by extension, is it not a good thing to have a proper game with actual jeopardy? If there is the possibility of a bad result, there is something to be gained from getting a good one. The fear is that defeat could bring the knives out for Tuchel from those supporters who, frankly, had made up their minds about him before he had taken charge of his first game. Kane wanted to push the upside.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you go to tough environments, you sometimes come away, especially when you win, with an even better feeling,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen you get through these types of games together, especially as a newish team like we are, that\u2019s how you build experiences and togetherness.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere might be times when we have to stick together, defend as a team and, ultimately, find a way to win. When you are able to do that against these types of oppositions in these stadiums, I feel like that builds an extra layer of togetherness that you can\u2019t form without playing.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo far [under Tuchel], we\u2019ve had a lot of games where we\u2019ve played against low blocks, where we\u2019ve had a lot of possession and have almost played against ourselves in a way. The teams we\u2019ve faced are almost happy to lose 1-0 or 2-0, whereas tomorrow night is going to be completely different. Hopefully, we can show the best version of ourselves \u2013 with and without the ball.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kane might have liked to make one final point about Belgrade, Marseille and Istanbul, his unholy trinity, although he left it unsaid. His Spurs team won 4-0 and 2-1 at Red Star and Marseille respectively, while Bayern beat Galatasaray 3-1. Kane loves these battles. Once more unto the breach.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Harry Kane has played before at the Red Star Stadium in Belgrade. It was with his former club…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":409641,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-409640","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-sports","9":"tag-uk","10":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115172695696896665","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409640","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=409640"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409640\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/409641"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=409640"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=409640"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=409640"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}