Harry Kane will end the season with no trophies despite scoring 44 goals for Bayern (Picture: Getty)
Harry Kane says he is ‘proud’ of Bayern Munich’s Champions League semi-final display against Real Madrid but ‘gutted’ to be eliminated from the competition after a dramatic 4-3 aggregate defeat.
After last week’s absorbing 2-2 draw in Munich, Alphonso Davies returned to Thomas Tuchel’s starting XI and gave Bayern the lead with a stunning solo effort to silence the Bernabeu.
Bayern appeared to have one foot in an all-German Champions League final – after Borussia Dortmund’s win over PSG the previous evening – but Joselu had other ideas, coming off the bench to complete a quickfire brace and send the Madrid crowd into raptures.
Carlo Ancelotti’s men, the newly crowned La Liga champions, held on to secure their spot at Wembley, where they will look to beat Dortmund and seal a record-extending 15th European title.
Bayern, meanwhile, must pick themselves up off the floor after blowing their last remaining shot at silverware this season, with two games left of their Bundesliga campaign against Wolfsburg and Hoffenheim.
Kane – who has scored 44 goals in a record-breaking debut season for Bayern – was taken off with five minutes remaining of Wednesday’s second leg and the England captain watched on in despair as Joselu turned the tie on its head at the death.
‘Gutted. Last night was tough to take,’ the Bayern striker told his followers on X and Instagram this afternoon.
‘Proud of how we battled over the two legs which says everything you need to know about the spirit of this team and how far we can go. #MiaSanMia.’
Tuchel has faced heavy criticism for removing Kane at such a critical stage of the game, but the German insisted the ex-Tottenham forward had been struggling with a back problem and needed to be brought off.
‘We started with a front four and all four has to go out with injury or cramp,’ Tuchel explained in his post-match interview with TNT Sports.
‘Kane was having back problems, it was no longer possible. The front four all said they had to go.’
Joselu was Madrid’s unlikely hero in a pulsating second leg (Picture: Getty)
Paul Scholes suggested Tuchel’s decision to replace Kane in the 85th minute had a touch of arrogance about it given the semi-final was far from over.
‘In some ways it’s almost an arrogant sub,’ the former Manchester United and England midfielder said in the TNT Sports studio.
‘Thinking I can afford to take your biggest goal-scorer, biggest threat off the pitch and still go on and beat Real Madrid.
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‘Even if they’d got one goal, there’s still another half hour of the game [extra-time].
‘There’s a long way to go without your best players on the pitch.
‘They were always going to try and score goals on the counter-attack and I thought Harry Kane was perfect for that, I mean more playing other people in.’
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