Joe Hart has praised Harry Kane for his stuttering run-up which saw Croatia goalkeeper Dominik Livakovic come off his line early in England’s 4-2 win over Croatia.
Livakovic saved Kane’s initial effort, but referee Clement Turpin ordered the kick to be retaken after VAR concluded that the Croatian had moved too soon.
Kane dispatched the retake to open the scoring and went on to add another goal with a header from a corner late in the first half.
“It’s a ploy he’s used and he’s brought into his game recently — this stutter,” Hart said on the BBC. “Now, as a goalkeeper it’s really difficult, because he doesn’t keep the rhythm always.
“Livakovic would have seen his previous penalties. His previous two, he hasn’t stuttered, and the one before that [for Bayern Munich against Atalanta in the Champions League], he did.”
Hart, who played with Kane for both Tottenham and England, said that the England striker had started introducing a stutter into some of his penalties so that goalkeepers do not know whether to dive straight away or to hold their ground.
“That’s what he’s added to his game,” Hart said. “He’s realised that potentially someone’s going to go the right way eventually. So once he’s brought this little stutter in, which he still hits the ball cleanly after, it’s so difficult for the goalkeeper to hold his ground, like we saw there with Livakovic.
“He held for as long as he could and ended up falling off his line. It was a poor penalty by Harry Kane’s standards, but just to see the calmness in him to say ‘Referee, just check that for me.’
“And then two or three minutes later, slots it into the bottom corner with no stutter — he just keeps adding strings to his bow.”
In a post-match interview with BBC Sport, Kane said that he had specifically targeted Livakovic as a goalkeeper who the stutter might work against.
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“When I watched the clips, I saw that he likes to move early, pretty much,” Kane said. “So I knew there was a chance, if I done the stutter, that he would come off the line.
“When it happened, I was 80% sure that it was off the line. I wasn’t 100% sure. And then obviously, once it got retaken, I changed the technique a little bit.
“So yeah, these are all reasons why I do the research. And in the end, obviously, it worked out nicely for me.”
