Harry Kane on The Hot Ones: A forensic breakdown of the Tottenham striker’s appearance on the cult YouTube show

Sometimes, you are presented with a collaboration that is so perfectly bizarre, so intriguingly unexpected, that you wonder how you ever lived without it. I’m thinking of those white chocolate Kit Kat Chunkies with Lotus Biscoff spread in the middle, or that time Fred Durst stormed the stage at the 2000 VMA’s to perform Livin’ It Up with Christina Aguilera. Simpler times.

Imagine my awestruck delight, then, when it was announced that Tottenham Hotspur and England talisman Harry Kane would be making an appearance on First We Feast’s sublime YouTube series, The Hot Ones. For the uninitiated, the show consists of host Sean Evans - second only to the legendary Nardwuar in the thoroughness of his interrogatory research - asking questions of a guest while they both eat chicken wings coated in the some of the most absurdly spicy and downright violent hot sauces known to man. It is, in every sense, a winning format, but not one that I ever envisaged Kane partaking in.

Nevertheless, here we are. At the time of writing, the episode has clocked up over a million views in its first 24 hours, and now, in the name of proper journalism, it is my venerated duty to assess how the greatest goal-scorer this country has ever produced (sorry Alan Shearer) fairs against a plate of marinated fowl.

WING ONE: THE CLASSIC - CHILI MAPLE

Just prior to chowing down, Harry admits that he is not usually a fan of spicy food. This does not give me hope. Going into The Hot Ones with no spice tolerance is like going into a nuclear reactor without a hazmat suit. There’s no turning back now though, Hazza. Armageddon is upon ye.

First bite, and Harry claims that things are not too bad. His concerned smirk and the manner in which he wipes his nose with the back of his hand says otherwise. In fairness to Kane, he takes it in his stride, like a well-timed Son Heung-min through ball, but let’s not get cocky here. Nobody actually struggles with the first wing. Even DJ Khaled made it to wing number three.

But what’s this? A sip of milk at the opening juncture? Oh, Harry. No. This is a national tragedy. This is more gutting than the penalty miss against France. I am beginning to fear the worst.

WING TWO: CURRY VERDE HOT SAUCE

Plot twist: Harry actually finds this one, and I quote, ‘a little easier’. I should have known better than to doubt a man with a World Cup golden boot to his name. Sean is rolling out the footballing analogies with glee, and our beautiful boy is lapping them up with bright eyes and a renewed sense of optimism.

Now we’re talking about youth football, and in particular Harry’s time with Ridgeway Rovers - the same club that gave the world David Beckham. Are there any other teams in England who can claim to have produced two England captains within the span of a decade or so? Surely not.

Oh, he’s just had another sip of bloody milk...

WING THREE: ZESTY LEMON PEPPER HOT SAUCE

Straight in on this one, no hesitations, but Harry’s enthusiastic hubris is met with an immediate kick back from one of Brooklyn’s finest exports. Even Kane himself is starting to vocalise his growing alarm. English palates, finely tuned to a diet of unseasoned root vegetables and boiled farmyard birds, are not designed to be subjected to such heat, and Harry Kane - with his demeanour and general appearance like a charming mid-century accountant - might be the most English man we have. Disaster brews.

As a veteran onlooker to these atrocities, you can tell when Sean is concerned about the fate of a guest. Already he is turning to pep talks, reminding Harry of the mental strength that has taken him to the very top of professional sport.

Now Kane is waxing lyrical about Son (is that a tear in my eye, or is it a stray globule of hot sauce), and reveals that his favourite ever goal that he has scored was the one he bagged on his England debut at Wembley. He’s a genuine sweetheart, is Harry.

WING FOUR: CHICHO-GHOST HOT SAUCE

I’m struggling to get a proper read on Kane here. In one breath, he’s complaining about the heat, in the next he’s claiming that he’s pleasantly surprised with how things are going. It’s this kind of unpredictability that must make him such a nightmare to mark for defenders.

It’s NFL chat on this wing. We only deal with proper football here. Next!

(I jest, please don’t send me any irate emails. Thanks in advance.)

WING FIVE: LOS CALIENTES ROJO

Halfway mark, and our first glimpse of perspiration around the temples. Full credit to Harry, though, he’s holding this together well. It’s actually been a pretty decent metaphor for his career so far; bit of a slow start, but he’s really starting to find his groove.

The Hot Ones’ very own house sauce is despatched with the unerring assuredness of a free header in the six-yard box.

WING SIX: MAKO SNAKE HOT SAUCE

Okay, folks, we’re really rattling now. With his signature minimal backlift Kane is on to wing six. The Spicy Shark, as it is also known, is a blistering little number that begins with notes of sweetness from banana, coconut, and sweet potato before slowly building into a crescendo of Carolina Reapers and ghost peppers. Let me just tell you, for the avoidance of doubt, we’re not in Kansas anymore.

There’s a sudden pensive dourness to Harry, like a sheepish dog (not be confused with a sheep dog) who has been scolded for chewing through an important pile of unopened mail. His tail is firmly between his legs, regrets are flourishing like hellish flower buds from vines of molten miscalculation. Somebody on his press team is getting fired for this one.

Speaking of the press, Kane is now speaking of the press. He wishes that more English athletes could be less guarded with the media, like their American counterparts. If it leads to a greater number of his peers subjecting themselves to a gauntlet of insanely hot chicken wings in the name of blithe entertainment, I fully advocate for this too.

WING SEVEN: JALAPEÑO CHICO

There is a great sadness in Harry’s gaze now, a desolate hopelessness that comes only from knowing that one is in a position of vast peril from which there is no tangible escape. He is resigned to his fate, lost to the frothing rapids of inhumane heat like a wrecked vessel as it slips beneath the choppy, brutal tongues of the crashing swells. He is almost out of milk.

Through the fiery haze, Kane is reminiscing about a moment from that World Cup group stage clash against Panama in which he scored a hat-trick. I watched that match in a pub in Aberystwyth and had a magnificent portion of fish and chips. What I’m trying to say is that we both had a pretty good afternoon that day.

WING EIGHT: DA BOMB BEYOND INSANITY

Quick sidebar; this might only be wing number eight, but in reality Da Bomb Beyond Insanity is essentially the hottest sauce known to man. It is not designed to taste, it is designed to hurt. It is made to punish in the most pointlessly performative of ways, like the bottled essence of an Evel Knievel stunt with an added sadistic dash of pepper extract. If Harry gets through this, he can get through anything.

There is trepidation, almost giddy in its disbelief, and then we are in. The heat comes fast, the milk - replenished in anticipation - is reached for immediately. The England captain is coughing, spluttering, suffering. A Kane hasn’t felt this much heat since WWE upped their pyro budget in the Attitude Era. All pretence and media training is scorched away like tinder in a bush fire. We have finally reached the core of the man.

Sean asks Harry what his favourite football chant is. Harry responds that he likes it when the Tottenham support sing ‘He’s one of our own, he’s one of our own’. The candour is searing. Also, not to stir the pot, but after hearing that, if he does leave this summer, even I’ll be devastated, Spurs fans.

But y’know what, he’s doing alright here. His face is the colour of a Maraschino cherry and his eyes look like they might involuntarily eject from their sockets at any moment, but he’s ploughing on, chatting away and holding his own. I’m on the brink of getting up and singing the national anthem, swear down.

WING NINE: WATERMELON GHOST HOT SAUCE

And on he pushes; undettered, unafraid, unbowed. The radioactive dust from Da Bomb is settling, and once again Harry is eating a sauce that, by his own estimation, he could enjoy with a meal. Is that true, or has his mouth just sustained so much irreparable heat damage that his tastebuds are cowering, numb to the horror of it all?

Still the milk is swigged, still he answers questions with a frankly humbling level of composure, this time on the armchair psychology of wooing referees. Presumably at this point, after willingly participating in such lunacy, Harry has lost the right to assess anybody’s inner psyche.

WING TEN: THE LAST DAB: APOLLO

At long last, here we are; The Last Dab. Hot Ones custom dictates that it is purely voluntary as to whether or not a guest chooses to add a little extra of this sauce to their final wing, but after riding some rough currents and giving me more than a few frights, Harry isn’t going to falter now.

In he piles, chewing and deliberating before wiping his mouth with a paper napkin and uttering a gentle ‘Wow’ as he looks Sean steadily in the eye. As the heat begins to settle, his face noticeably brightens, and soon enough he is defining all kinds of football-specific lingo to our American host in a playful quickfire back and forth. ‘Fox in the box’, ‘dead ball specialist’, ‘howler’; he expounds them all.

All that is left is for Harry to look flush into the camera, thank the viewers at home, talk a little about the recently launched foundation bearing his name, and then retreat to a darkened room while he seriously considers the life choices that brought him to this point.

It got sketchy for a while, and for the rest of his life the mere mention of a habanero might be enough to trigger a kind of heat-induced shellshock, but once again, the England captain has reminded us why he is universally accepted as one of football’s proper good guys. Plus, surely he can get a brand endorsement from Cravendale or something out the back of this too.