England striker Harry Kane finished Euro 2024 in a six-way tie for the Golden Boot top scorer as his team lost the final 2-1 to Spain. It was another individual accolade for a player yet to win a major trophy for club or country.

Kane ended the tournament tied on three goals with Spain midfielder Dani Olmo, Germany midfielder Jamal Musiala, Netherlands forward Cody Gakpo, Slovakia winger Ivan Schranz and Georgia striker Georges Mikautadze.

Kane has now been a runner-up in back-to-back European Championship finals after England’s loss to Italy three years ago, and a runner-up in one Champions League final and two English League Cups. He’s won a string of individual awards, including Bundesliga top scorer last season at Bayern Munich, but the German club had its first season without a trophy since 2012.

 

It’s an opportunity missed. It’s not easy to get to these finals,” Kane told British broadcaster ITV of England’s loss to Spain. “It takes unbelievable resilience and character to get to where we are but ultimately you take the opportunity when it comes and we haven’t done it again. It’s extremely painful, it’s going to hurt for a long, long time.

Kane is one of four men’s players to have been top scorer at both a European Championship and a World Cup, something he achieved in 2018.

Olmo’s main contribution to Spain’s win in the final was defensive, as he cleared Marc Guhi’s header off the line to keep his team in the lead late on.

I told him that he is my top scorer because his save counts as a goal for me,” goalkeeper Unai Simn said. It was our planned defense for him to protect that post, but he remembered to do just that and cleared it off the line. It was incredible.

 

For Olmo, being joint top scorer at Euro 2024 is a moment in the spotlight for a player who has faced repeated injury setbacks. He took an unorthodox path to the top of European soccer, leaving Barcelona’s renowned youth academy at the age of 16 in 2014 and making his pro debut with Croatian club Dinamo Zagreb. He’s played in Germany with Leipzig since 2019.

UEFA allowed multiple players to share the Euro 2024 top scorer award if they scored the same number of goals, in a change from recent tournaments.

At the last men’s European Championship, Portugal’s Cristiano Ronaldo and Czech striker Patrik Schick both had five goals but Ronaldo was named the winner because he had an assist and Schick had none.

Under the old system, Olmo would have won the tiebreaker with two assists, the most among the players tied on three goals.

The last time that three goals proved enough to win the Golden Boot was at Euro 2012, when Spain’s Fernando Torres took the prize. At the time, the tiebreaker was which player had played the fewest minutes. If that had applied at Euro 2024, the award would have gone to Slovakia’s Schranz.

UEFA named Spain midfielder Rodri its player of the tournament and Spain forward Lamine Yamal, who turned 17 on Saturday, was the young player of the tournament.

 

First Published: Jul 15 2024 | 10:28 AM IST