Let’s stop this nonsense with the armband
Sir Bobby Charlton, who celebrates his 80th birthday on Tuesday, captained his country only three times in his 106-cap career.
Bobby is widely recognised as England’s greatestever player and, at his peak, skippered Manchester United to the League title and European Cup, yet no-one ever questioned why he didn’t lead out his international side more often.
From May, 1964 until November, 1973, that was Bobby Moore’s job. Charlton – along with everyone else in the country – was happy to acknowledge that.
Since Moore’s final game, England have had 44 different captains.
Some have been natural leaders and established club skippers like Bryan Robson, Steven Gerrard, Tony Adams and John Terry.
Others have been the “star man”, like Kevin Keegan, Gary Lineker, David Beckham and Michael Owen.
Gareth Southgate still hasn’t decided on who will be his skipper in Russia next summer.
He dislikes the cult of personality which has built up around the armband over the last decade, and has deliberately shared it around Harry Kane, Gary Cahill, Jordan Henderson and Joe Hart since he took over.
He says he’s trying to foster a greater sense of shared responsibility.
However, there is no point is pussy-footing around any longer. Kane is clearly the man for the job and he might as well be confirmed in the role now.
He would come into the “star man” category and he doesn’t skipper Spurs. But his appointment would be much more than a bit of ego-massaging for the team’s best player, like Portugal have done with Cristiano Ronaldo or Argentina have with Lionel Messi.
Kane has become the natural leader of this group of England players, not only because he’s the only one who comes close to being world-class, but also because he sets an example to the rest in terms of his attitude on, and off, the pitch.
His nearest equivalent among the 44 post-Moore skippers is Alan Shearer, who was given the armband by Glenn Hoddle because he was the best player.
Despite the fact he was a striker – not the ideal position for captaincy – he set the standard for the rest, in terms of professionalism and desire.
Kane is like that. He’s also the perfect character to represent the team away from the pitch. He inter-acts well with the media, sponsors, fans and the FA hierarchy.
Another advantage at a torrid time for the FA is that, as well as having a squeaky clean manager in Southgate, they would also have a squeaky-clean captain.
Kane is already the team’s poster boy, so there’s nothing Southgate can do now to stop him being the marquee player.
He might as well announce him as captain and be done with it.