Lay off Harry Kane! England captain is putting together one of the greatest goalscoring seasons of recent times despite Bayern Munich's struggles

Kane's goalscoring prowess has never been called into question. He scored 213 times in the Premier League for Spurs, and was well on track to break Alan Shearer's record of 260 when he left for Bayern. He eclipsed 20 strikes in the English top-flight on six occasions - hitting 30 in his final campaign in England.

In the Bundesliga, he has been just as effective. After being trolled for his lack of contribution in a meaningless friendly, Kane has battered the league. In 25 starts, he has scored 30 goals, while also adding six assists. He is overperforming his 24.5 expected goals by some margin - the mark of a classy finisher. His numbers haven't been as eye-catching in Europe, but he still has six in eight, with three assists thrown in for good measure.

He only needed three months to become the top-scoring Englishman in a Bundesliga season. If he continues this form - and he is showing few signs of slowing down after bagging a hat-trick against Mainz on March 9 - Kane could comfortably hit 50 in all competitions.

And these goals have come in crucial situations, too. It has long been a criticism of Kane that he hasn't shown up in the right moments. He was anonymous in the Euro 2020 final, barely got a kick in the 2019 Champions League final, and missed a penalty at the 2022 World Cup that ultimately saw the Three Lions exit the tournament.

But his ability to show up in key moments this season has been invaluable - especially for a misfiring Bayern side. He scored and assisted in his side's 4-3 win over Manchester United to open the Champions League group stage; he found the net in a 2-2 draw with league leaders Bayer Leverkusen; and on March 5, he fired a brace to overturn a 1-0 aggregate deficit against Lazio in the Champions League last 16. Hat-tricks against Borussia Dortmund, Darmstadt, Bochum and Mainz only further his case.

Perhaps his only absentee showing was in a 3-0 loss to Leverkusen in early February, a game in which Bayern were so thoroughly outplayed that even Tuchel criticised his side for not getting Kane more involved. That defeat was by no means Kane's fault, and when Bayern have needed their star man, he has answered the call on almost every occasion.

Robert Lewandowski put up historic numbers in the 2020-21 season. In just 29 games, he found the net 41 times - a Bundesliga record. He scored a goal every 60 minutes domestically, and every 103 in the Champions League. That he came second to Lionel Messi in Ballon d'Or voting, just a year after a presumptive snub when the award was cancelled, was a surprise.

Enter Kane. The Englishman is scoring at a rate that is equal to what Lewandowski managed in his record-breaking season. If he continues his current pace, Kane will finish the season with the same number of goals.

However, with the shackles likely to be off in the final weeks of the campaign as Tuchel's time in charge winds down and the title race all but over, don't be surprised if Bayern take out their frustrations on some lower hanging fruit, such as they did in the 8-1 win over Mainz. Expect Kane to be to the fore if there are any repeat results before mid-May.

Outside of Germany, no one else in Europe is coming close to Kane's numbers this season. Despite his prolific seasons of old, Kane has never won the European Golden Shoe. The Premier League has always offered stern competition, while Lewandowski, Erling Haaland, Lionel Mess and others have kept him out of the running.

This year, though, Kane is clear. His 30 domestic goals are seven more than second-placed Lautaro Martinez of Inter, ands nine more than Stuttgart hotshot Serhou Guirassy in third. Kylian Mbappe, meanwhile, has 21 to his name, while Haaland is further back at 18. Should Kane continue to score at his current rate - or even improve - he will end the campaign with the highest Golden Shoe-winning total since Cristiano Ronaldo bagged 48 in the 2014-15 season.

Bayern may not be racking up the results to match his production, but Kane should at least earn some more individual trophies to go with his potentially historic campaign.

There seems to be a pattern of bad luck to Kane's career. Every time he reaches a new milestone, there is some sort of detracting force that draws attention away from his achievements. In the 2017-18 season, he found the net 30 times for Tottenham in the league - and averaged a goal every 103 minutes. His Champions League numbers were even better, with the striker bagging a goal every 85 minutes. But his success was largely silenced by the emergence of Mohamed Salah at Liverpool, who scored 32 in the league, and 44 in all competitions.

The same happened last season. Kane scored 30, only to be eclipsed by Haaland, who found the net a record 36 times during his debut campaign at Manchester City. More broadly, there is the prevailing feeling that Kane was never quite part of a team good enough to compete for silverware befitting his talents. Spurs were always on the periphery of the elite, the best of the upper-middle-class of Premier League teams.

It is an unfortunate twist of fate, then, that he has arrived on this Bayern team - in this season. The Bavarians have been poor this year; they concede too many cheap goals, and don't control games with their expected gusto. They are, fundamentally, too easy to beat. This would not be an issue in most normal Bundesliga seasons, but the rise of Xabi Alonso's Leverkusen side has seen the Bavarians fall well behind their title rivals.

Bayern probably won't win the Bundesliga title in 2024, and. Kane might therefore go another year without a trophy. History, it seems, repeats.

Still, for all of the talk of curses, and all of the meticulous dissections of goal-scoring numbers, Kane might yet bring silverware to Bavaria in the unlikeliest of circumstances. Leverkusen have a 10-point lead in the Bundesliga with nine games remaining, but Bayern do look to be rounding into something approaching form. A post-international break wobble from Leverkusen, a club that has historically done its best to avoid winning major trophies from advantageous situations, does not feel entirely out of the question.

The Champions League, too, remains a possibility. Though there are stronger teams in the field - Man City and Real Madrid would certainly be favoured over Bayern - a kind quarter-final draw could put Kane's side in the picture. And for all of the criticism that the soon-to-depart Tuchel has quite rightly received over the last few months, he remains a shrewd manager who can get results in big games.

For Kane, though, this season should not be defined by the games Bayern don't win, or the trophies they fail to snare. Instead, it should be remembered as a campaign in which an already world-class player showed that he has so much more to give.