Soccer star Harry Kane on what separates great golfers from good ones

Like many of the world’s top athletes, English soccer star Harry Kane is obsessed with golf. But unlike many of the world’s top athletes, Kane is exceptionally good at the game, too.

A low single-digit handicap (he’s currently a 3, but not quite playing to it, he says), Kane, in his understated way, describes himself as a “decent” golfer, and says he’s still acclimating to his new home in Munich, Germany, after joining FC Bayern Munich in 2023.

“I’ve only been to the course once or twice,” Kane told GOLF.com in a recent interview facilitated by Reflo, the sustainable performancewear company for which Kane is a global golf ambassador. “The weather’s a little bit different out here. There’s a bit more snow and a bit more frost. I’ll probably have to wait ’til March to get back out on the golf course.”

For most recreational players, it might not feel fair that Kane, who captains England’s men’s national team, can excel in not one but two major sports. Then again, Kane is Kane. He says his success on the course comes down to his natural hand-eye coordination and his love of the game.

Still, as with all golfers, Kane has room for improvement, and he’s played with enough of the game’s greats to know that there’s still a significant gap between their abilities and his own.

So, what in his mind separates good golfers from the ones we watch on TV on Sunday afternoons?

“I’ve been lucky enough to play with some of the best pros, and it’s just a different ball game for them,” he said. “It really is the consistency. I’m able to have probably one great round in in 20. These guys are having 20 great rounds in 25, or maybe even better, especially when you’re looking at the best players in the world. So just that consistency, and it comes down to practice. I look at how I got to where I am now in football, the the hours of dedication, the hours of hard work and hours on the training pitch. It all adds up to, you know, perfecting their craft.

“And then that’s what those guys have done to perfect their craft in in the golf game, the amount of hours they spend on the chipping green and the putting green and on the range and working on their swing. That’s why they are where they are. So yeah, a 3-handicap is good, but it’s such a big jump from from someone like me to to them. And I think consistency is the number one word because they’re just able to produce it shot after shot. And that’s the most difficult thing to do.”

For more from Kane, including whether or not he would consider pursuing pro golf when he retires from soccer, check out the full interview below.

Golf.com Editor

As a four-year member of Columbia’s inaugural class of female varsity golfers, Jessica can out-birdie everyone on the masthead. She can out-hustle them in the office, too, where she’s primarily responsible for producing both print and online features, and overseeing major special projects, such as GOLF’s inaugural Style Is­sue, which debuted in February 2018. Her origi­nal interview series, “A Round With,” debuted in November of 2015, and appeared in both in the magazine and in video form on GOLF.com.