Harry Kane cuts sorry figure on a desolate night for England | Euro 2024

This was not Harry’s game. It was not his or England’s tournament either and perhaps, once they have picked themselves off the floor from a traumatic, climactic night in Berlin, they will acknowledge that something has indeed changed forever. The sight of Harry Kane removing his armband, handing it to Kyle Walker and running to swap places with Ollie Watkins in the 61st minute was an oddly moving finale to his summer. This was not how anybody had envisaged his role in breaking a personal trophy drought and ending the hex upon his country, too.

As Spain celebrated in the centre circle Kane stood impassively in the technical area, gathering his emotions before making his way around his stricken, desolate teammates. He had hoped to crown his life’s work here but instead all the goals and personal accolades that, the day before the final, he had offered to swap for collective success will have to stay put.

The consideration for Gareth Southgate, or anyone who succeeds him, may be that England have looked livelier and fresher in his absence for some weeks. Cole Palmer’s moment of brilliance may not have denied Spain the title they richly deserved but his impact, and the movement of a sprightly Watkins, may have pointed to the future.

Two and a half hours previously, the possibility of fulfilment had remained intact. England’s bus had arrived at 7.29pm, winding its way past the woodlands and training pitches that surround Olympiastadion and depositing its inhabitants at the door. It was striking to see Kane emerge first, five seconds before anyone else, setting a pace towards the dressing room without a glance backwards.

This was business, an impression cemented during the pre-match walkabout. Spain’s players were already mingling by the halfway line when Kane, again well ahead of the pack, led England out to absorb the scene. They were still there when he took them back in again after the briefest of turns around the turf. The message, driven by the captain, seemed clear: any sightseeing in this strange, historic, discomfiting venue could wait.

In those few minutes, was Kane attempting to visualise the moment that could change the narrative of an entire career? It is one of his favoured preparation methods: thinking about the touch, the turn, the dart to the near post, the knee-high leap and twist in the air that write the record books. He had spoken earlier in the week of England’s “aura”, a sheen and control acquired through learning that semi-finals and finals need not be strangers.

The problem for Kane was that his own sense of inevitability had diminished. England had not exactly made it this far despite him, but they had needed fresh faces to solve old problems. It felt significant and new that Kane’s deputies, Ivan Toney and the newly history-enshrined Watkins, had done more to shift the dial on their panoramic journey here.

By half-time the awkward sense was that England may need another such intervention. Broadly the game was going to plan: the wisdom had been that, the longer proceedings remained level, they would be the likelier winners. Spain had largely been reduced to aimless crosses while Lamine Yamal had looked vague and imprecise. But Kane had not exactly led the charge for England and it was little surprise, as the 20-minute mark passed, that he had not touched the ball.

When he did, he received a yellow card for the resulting follow-through on Aymeric Laporte. The gruel was always going to be thin for England, particularly in those early moments when Spain sought to discover whether things might be wrapped up quickly. They needed to make the most of what pressure bursts they could muster, but Bukayo Saka spurned an invitation to find Kyle Walker and Phil Foden was off balance when free at the far post.

Just before the whistle a moody Jude Bellingham forced a mistake from Dani Carvajal and finally Kane had his shooting chance. He has said he can remember each of his 406 career goals if he thinks hard enough: there have certainly been plenty from this kind of range, on the edge of the penalty area, but Rodri hurled himself into a thudding block. Any pictures painted in that earlier stroll had been splattered with red and navy spray.

From England’s perspective Kane had, at least, inadvertently brought about Rodri’s exit. Events seemed weighted in their favour now, and perhaps in the captain’s too. But what were Kane and Phil Foden thinking when, neither pressing nor standing off, they let the substitute Martin Zubimendi stroll between them and build the move that brought Nico Williams’ smoothly-taken opener?

There was an elephant in the room and England’s support addressed it in the 57th minute with loud chants of Watkins’ name. Even so, the speed with which Southgate responded came as a shock. Wednesday night’s hero was poised and the cruel joke might have that Kane, recognising the situation’s gravity, moved with greater purpose than at any point in the night when his number came up. While England applauded their fans five minutes after the end, Kane’s name was read out among six players to share the Euro 2024 golden boot. The personal and collective grief here, though, were stark.