Kane following Gerrard on journey of boyhood dreams

The phrase ‘boyhood dream’ is rather over-used in football, but even the most cynical amongst us could not fail to tingle, surely, at the thought of winning the Champions League playing for the club we supported as a child. The idea of watching from the terraces at 11 years old, with all the wide-eyed daydreams of youth yet to be knocked down by life and reality, is emotive enough on its own without juxtaposing that memory with a picture of your future self lifting the big-eared trophy aloft 15 years later.

Such a scenario makes your insides burst at the sheer thought of it; and yet that is what Harry Kane can achieve with Tottenham this weekend in Madrid — 14 years after Liverpool’s Steven Gerrard did exactly the same in Istanbul. The way that Gerrard achieved his dream — man of the match after inspiring one of the greatest comebacks of all time — means it would be nigh-on impossible to top that experience.