GOAL brings you all the major takeaways from British stars playing overseas, including the current England captain and Los Blancos' star midfielder
Typically, the Premier League and Championship have been home to Britain's most talented footballers down the years, with the odd few plying their trade in the Scottish Premiership. Sometimes, though, they must spread their wings and head abroad to either take their careers to the next level or revive them.
Harry Kane and Jude Bellingham both fall into the first bracket. In Kane's case, landing major silverware was the ultimate goal when he left his boyhood club Tottenham to join Bayern Munich in the summer of 2023, while Bellingham moved away from England at the tender age of 17 when joining Borussia Dortmund in 2020, before completing a dream transfer to Real Madrid three years later.
England's most prized duo have thrived since leaving their comfort zones, with Kane proving to be the perfect long-term replacement for Robert Lewandowski at Bayern while Bellingham has helped Madrid re-affirm their standing as the best team in Europe. And as we enter the final few months of the 2024-25 campaign, both men are in a great position to enhance their legacies.
After the first international break of the year, Kane and Bellingham picked up from where they left off at club level. However, there were contrasting fortunes for some of Britain's other representatives on foreign soil. GOAL runs through all the biggest talking points in this week's edition of Brits Abroad…
Getty ImagesKane rediscovers his scoring touch
Kane scored two goals as England opened their 2026 World Cup qualifying campaign under Thomas Tuchel in solid fashion, but returned to Bayern looking to snap a five-game mini drought. When St Pauli visited the Allianz Arena on Saturday, it only took Kane 17 minutes to do exactly that, as he produced a powerful first-time finish to put Bayern in front after Jamal Musiala and Michael Olise capitalised on some poor defending from the away side.
That goal, which was the England captain's 22nd in the Bundesliga this term, means Kane has now scored against all 19 teams he has faced in the German top flight, a feat only bettered by a certain Miroslav Klose, who scored against 28 different clubs across spells at Bayern, Werder Bremen and Kaiserslautern. Kane also provided a brilliant assist for Leroy Sane late on as Bayern wrapped up a 3-2 win, putting the ball on a plate for the ex-Manchester City man after a clever interchange with Olise down the right flank.
The result saw Bayern maintain their six-point lead at the Bundesliga summit, and if Vincent Kompany's side do end up wrestling back the title from Bayer Leverkusen, it will be in no small part down to Kane's prolific scoring exploits his playmaking prowess. Incredibly, he seems to be getting even better with age, and fully deserves his first taste of tangible success come May.
It was not such an enjoyable day for Kane's England team-mate Eric Dier, though. The 31-year-old was too slow to react when Elias Saad equalised for St Pauli, and gave Lars Ritzka far too much time to pick his spot to score the visitors' late consolation goal. It was a performance that goes a long way to explaining why Bayern have yet to offer Dier a contract extension to keep him in Bavaria beyond the summer.
AdvertisementBellingham revives Real
Real Madrid looked to be in serious trouble heading in at half-time during their latest La Liga outing against Leganes. Kylian Mbappe had given Los Blancos the lead from the penalty spot, but Leganes hit back quickly to take a 2-1 advantage into the break, which would have brought great joy to table-topping Barcelona.
Madrid needed someone to step forward and shake them back into life, and as has been the case so often over the past two years, it was Bellingham who answered the call. Just two minutes after the restart, the midfielder fired in a low shot that forced Leganes goalkeeper Marko Dimitrovic into a superb save at his near post, and after Brahim Diaz's rebound effort then crashed back into play off the bar, the former Birmingham City starlet darted in with a full-stretch volley to level the scoreline.
Mbappe would go on to score his second and give Madrid a vital 3-2 victory, but it was Bellingham who deserved most of the credit for taking the game by the scruff of the neck. In addition to recording his 23rd goal involvement across all competitions this season, Bellingham ran himself into the ground and drove Madrid forward at every opportunity; on this form, he looks like a shoo-in to inherit the captain's armband when Luka Modric retires.
Gilmour's Napoli get better of Walker & Milan
"We have to start well, it’s important to start well when playing away," Kyle Walker told just before AC Milan's Serie A clash against Napoli kicked off on Sunday. "Against strong teams, there are no other chances if you go behind…" Unfortunately, the England full-back's warning fell on deaf ears.
Matteo Politano put Napoli ahead inside two minutes at the Diego Armando Maradona stadium as Milan were caught out by a simple ball over the top, and just 17 minutes later, Scotland's Bily Gilmour played in Romelu Lukaku to make it 2-0. As Walker had predicted, that deficit against a side chasing the Scudetto proved too much to claw back.
Luka Jovic did reduce the arrears late on, but Napoli held out for a win that keeps them within three points of leaders Inter. Walker, who has generally received positive reviews in Italy since his arrival in January, was not at fault for either of the goals Milan conceded, but the Manchester City loanee did not offer enough going forward as the Rossoneri slumped to their ninth league defeat of the season.
This was, however, a day in which football was of secondary importance to Milan. Ten-cap England international Ruben Loftus-Cheek had been in line to feature in the starting XI, but was instead rushed to hospital for emergency surgery to have his appendix removed. To the relief of everyone at the club, the surgery was a success, but Loftus-Cheek is facing a month on the sidelines as he recovers from the ordeal.
Getty ImagesMore struggles for 'non-existent' Greenwood
Mason Greenwood's debut season at Marseille was going so well until recently. The former Manchester United forward scored his 15th Ligue 1 goal of the season in a 2-0 victory over Nantes on March 2 (only Paris Saint-Germain's Ousmane Dembele has found the net more in the competition), and fresh links with Barcelona were raging as a result.
But Marseille boss Roberto De Zerbi then dropped Greenwood to the bench for a home fixture against Lens and publicly suggested he was falling short of the required standard in training, declaring: "He has to be more consistent, sacrifice more and be more determined." Marseille lost the game 1-0, but Greenwood was back among the substitutes for Le Classique the following week as PSG beat their arch-rivals 3-1 at Parc des Princes.
On Saturday, Greenwood made his return to De Zerbi's line up for a trip to Reims, but it was not a happy one. The 23-year-old barely had a sniff of goal as Marseille slipped to their third successive defeat, and gave him a brutal 2/10 score in their player ratings, describing his performance as "non-existent".
It was a brutal assessment, but an accurate one, and questions are now being asked of Greenwood's future again. He still lacking the maturity needed to be a truly world-class striker, and if Marseille end up missing out on Champions League qualification, he may well be singled out as a scapegoat by the club's demanding ultras.
