Harry Kane will make his 126th appearance for the England national team on Thursday at Wembley in the Nations League match against Croatia, becoming the player with the most caps in the history of the men's senior England team. The previous record was held by Peter Shilton, who made 125 appearances between 1970 and 1990.
Kane has scored 91 goals in his previous 125 appearances. He first played for England in 2015, scoring 79 seconds after coming on as a substitute in a Euro 2016 qualifier against Lithuania at Wembley. The manager at the time was Roy Hodgson, and the squad included captain Wayne Rooney and goalkeeper Joe Hart.
Current manager Thomas Tuchel stated that Kane deserves to win the Ballon d'Or and that he will reach the record of 126 caps in the next match. Tuchel added that Thursday is a well-deserved opportunity to celebrate an outstanding player. Kane has worked with five England managers during his career, with 81 of his 125 appearances coming under Gareth Southgate, who first gave him the captain's armband in 2017. As a starter, he was captain in 97 matches, more than any other player. He also played under Lee Carsley as interim manager in 2024 and in Sam Allardyce's only match in 2016.
Kane was born in London and grew up in Chingford. At the age of five, he wrote in a school project that his goal was to become a footballer. He spent weekends and holidays playing football in the local Ridgeway Park with his father Patrick and brother Charlie, using trees as goals while his father stood in goal. At Larkswood primary school, he played in the yard with only tennis balls, and he also played for the Sunday league team Ridgeway Rovers, from which his idol David Beckham also emerged. Beckham, who earned 115 caps for England between 1996 and 2009, sent a Real Madrid shirt to Kane's secondary school while he was playing for that club.
Kane described how he found it difficult to cope with England's penalty shootout defeat to Portugal in the quarter-finals of the 2006 World Cup under Sven-Göran Eriksson at the age of 12, as well as the failure to qualify for Euro 2008 under Steve McClaren. During most major tournaments, he went to the pub with friends to watch England, sitting in the beer garden in front of the screen. Last summer, after the victory over Croatia at the World Cup, he sang Wonderwall with the fans, which he called one of his favourite moments in the England shirt. Kane missed a penalty in the quarter-final defeat to France at the 2022 World Cup.
He has not yet won a major trophy with the national team in his career, but has won two consecutive Bundesliga titles with Bayern Munich. When England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland jointly host Euro 2028, Kane will be approaching his 35th year. Former captain of the West German team that won the 1990 World Cup, Lothar Matthäus, told BBC Sport that Kane has aged but also become better, like red wine. Kane himself says he feels physically excellent, that his numbers are as high as ever, and that he recently achieved a new top speed in a match against Borussia Dortmund.
