Former Tottenham man 'didn't think' Harry Kane would make it as a footballer

Former Tottenham Hotspur midfielder Jermaine Jenas has said that he 'didn't think' that Harry Kane would make it as a top-level footballer during their time together at Spurs.

While Jenas praised Kane's desire to score goals and cool nerves when presented with chances, he did not feel that Spurs' all-time top goalscorer had the athleticism that is necessary in a Premier League footballer.

Additionally, Jenas feels that Kane achieved success through hard work and determination, rather than possessing natural talent. He credits Mauricio Pochettino with molding Kane into the player that he is today with his gruelling fitness regimes.

What did Jermaine Jenas say in the interview?

Speaking on TalkSPORT, Jenas said: "If you watched Harry when he was at Spurs, playing under Mourinho and playing under Conte, they played very deep as a team. So they would suck teams onto them and Harry would drop into the little pockets of space, which as a kid, is how he used to play when he’d come and train with us in the first team.

“Everybody thought he was going to be like Teddy Sheringham and then Mauricio [Pochettino] turned him into more of an athlete and he would run in behind. When I was at Tottenham and he was probably 16 or 17 coming through the ranks with the likes of Andros Townsend, Danny Rose and Jake Livermore and so on.”

When asked if he thought Kane would reach the heights that he has, Jenas replied: "No, but this is part of Harry’s brilliance. He’s diligent, he works harder than the next and he’s driven by everybody who has told him he’s not good enough, essentially.

"He’s now got the make-up to do what he needs to do but from an athletic point of view he wasn’t as quick as he needed to be and wasn’t as strong or sharp as he needed to be, he just had a hunger to score goals."