Harry Kane: ‘Sometimes England don’t get the credit’

England captain Harry Kane said sometimes his team doesn’t get the credit it deserves at the top level. The Three Lions were able to seal their World Cup spot with two matches to spare after a 2-0 win over Albania on Sunday.

Harry Kane scored a brace in the second half to help his team register a comfortable win. This was England’s eighth win and eighth clean sheet in the qualifiers and they are currently at the top of Group K.

England also became the first European side to play at least six World Cup qualifiers and win them all without conceding.

“Whenever you’re creating history, it shows that you’re on the right path,” England captain Kane said.

“I think we’ve had a lot of great qualifying campaigns in recent history and we’ve topped that with this one, so we can be really proud of the hard work that we put in.

“I know sometimes we maybe don’t get the credit for these type of wins and campaigns, but we’ve done our job, we’ve done what we need to do and we’ve done it in style as well.

“We can be really proud of that and look forward to the new year now.”

England had finished as the runners-up in the two editions of the Euros under Gareth Southgate and Thomas Tuchel’s men will be determined to go all the way in the next year’s World Cup.

Asked if they have sent a message to the rest of the world with their flawless campaign, Kane said: “Whether it’s a message or not (I am not sure), I think it just shows what we’re capable of.

“Not conceding a goal in all that time is obviously a great achievement in itself and the bottom line is clean sheets win you tournaments.

“Clean sheets got us to two finals and semi-finals, and when you get to the biggest games you need to be solid, you need to be compact, you need to be able to defend your box and we’ve shown we can do that.

“Then you add the players that we have in attack and in midfield, we’re a tough team to beat.

“But there’s a long way to go, we’re not going to get carried away. I think that’s the special nature of this group.

“We’re just looking forward to the next camp, obviously a little while now, but we go away, we rest up, and then we come back together in March and try to continue this momentum.”

Harry Kane has been in fine form as he has scored 28 goals for club and country this season.