'You want to create drama': Harry Kane bet haunts Tottenham fans ahead of Champions League final
As Borussia Dortmund and Real Madrid prepare for their final showdown, both sides know there is no margin for error.
The two will face each other at Wembley Stadium in the Champions League final on Saturday, June 1, starting at 8 p.m., live on talkSPORT.
In a game of such magnitude, every right decision is crucial and every wrong decision could prove costly.
And if you want an example of how much a decision can affect a club, you only need to look Tottenham.
For Spurs fans, the memory of that fateful day at the Metropolitan Stadium in Madrid back in 2019 when lost 2-0 The Champions League final against Liverpool is still painful.
The north London team had reached the Champions League final for the first time in its history after a notable change in their semi-final clash against Ajax.
Their ability to continually pull victory from the jaws of defeat throughout the competition gave them a sense of invincibility heading into the final against Liverpool.
Unfortunately, it was a false sense of invincibility.
When the then Tottenham manager Mauricio Pochettino the team announced, there were more than a few raised eyebrows.
The star striker was on the list Harry Kane – a player who at the time had not played a competitive football match in almost two months.
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He England The captain had been battling a ligament injury to his left ankle, desperately hoping to recover in time for what could well have been one of the most important games of his career.
In the end, his coach made the perhaps unexpected decision to start him in the big game, despite his lack of recent playing time.
But even more surprising was that the hat-trick hero of Spurs' semi-final victory over Ajax, Lucas Moura, was demoted to the bench.
It seemed a cruel result for the player who had orchestrated Tottenham's run to the final.
In the end, the Brazilian striker only had 24 minutes to make an impact as a substitute in the final 2-0 defeat against Jurgen Klopp's Reds.
At that point, it was all too little, too late.
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“You want to create a drama, but it's not a drama,” Pochettino would say after the game when asked about Kane's ownership.
“It's just a decision. He finished the game fresh. I promise, my decision involved a lot of analysis. I don't regret my decision.”
But Kane had completed just nine passes and taken one shot during his 90 minutes on the pitch against Liverpool.
Maybe it was his fitness, maybe the occasion got to him, or Liverpool's defense had simply marshalled him magnificently.
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But there is one question that haunts Tottenham fans to this day: would the result have been different if Moura had started instead of Kane?
We will never know.
But while Kane, who is now also denied victory at Bayern Munich, is forced to watch another piece of silverware pass by. Dortmund and real Madrid Both will be aware that this final could become their club's best moment, or it could become their most unforgettable memory.
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