Maradona advice to Harry Kane did not include 'hand over club captaincy to Son Heung-min'
- This article is more than one year old.
- Published on September 12, 2023 at 04:35
- 3 min read
- By SHIM Kyu-Seok, AFP South Korea
Copyright © AFP 2017-2025. Any commercial use of this content requires a subscription. Click here to find out more.
"Hand over the captaincy to Son Heung-min, Maradona's big picture," reads the Korean-language title of a video that has been watched more than 500,000 times since it was posted on YouTube on August 18, 2023.
Maradona, who died from a heart attack in November 2020 at the age of 60, is an idol to millions of Argentines after he inspired the South American country to only its second World Cup triumph in 1986.
The Korean-language subtitles in the video feature an alleged exchange in which Maradona tells Kane to "go to Munich" and "hand the captaincy to him (Son Heung-min)". They imply Maradona is pointing towards Son, who is supposedly out of frame.
"I’ll be watching to the end whether you pass on the position," the subtitles continue, as Maradona gestures to his eyes.
The claim was shared after Son, who has scored 145 goals since joining English Premier League club Tottenham Hotspur in 2015, was named club captain following Kane's transfer to German champions Bayern Munich on August 12.
While he was never Spurs' club captain, Kane was widely expected to take the armband from French World Cup-winning goalkeeper Hugo Lloris had he remained in London rather than moving to Germany in pursuit of the first silverware of his career.
Links to the video were also shared on Facebook here, here and here.
Comments on the posts suggest many users believed the subtitles were accurate and praised Maradona for "predicting the future".
"Maradona had the uncanny ability to see the future," one user wrote. "A true legend, he was able to see Son's greatness," reads another comment.
But the subtitles misrepresent the pair's actual exchange, which occurred prior to a Premier League match in October 2017.
Shooting advice
A reverse image search on Google using keyframes from the false video led to longer footage of Maradona and Kane's meeting that was posted on Tottenham's official YouTube channel here on October 24, 2017 (archived link).
The false video corresponds to the section of the original video that begins at its one-minute, three-second mark.
The footage shows Maradona meeting Kane and club captain Lloris before a match against Liverpool. Also in attendance are fellow Argentines Mauricio Pochettino -- who was Tottenham's manager at the time -- and club ambassador Osvaldo Ardiles.
It shows Maradona praising Kane and Lloris and speaking to Kane about shooting, with his Spanish-language advice subtitled in English in the video and translated into English in person by Ardiles.
Below is a screenshot comparison between the false video (left) and the original clip posted on Tottenham's official YouTube channel (right):
According to the Spanish audio and English captions, Maradona advises Kane not to "always go near post with your shots" and to "go across goal sometimes" as opposing goalkeepers "watch you on TV all the time".
The original clip also shows the figure whom Maradona points to is not Son, but then-club captain Lloris, as captioned in this Getty Images photo from the meeting (archived link).
Son is neither seen in the video nor mentioned by anyone in the clip.
This meeting has been widely reported by multiple sports outlets, including here, here and here, which make no reference to Son (archived links here, here and here).
AFP could not find any official reports about Maradona advising Kane to hand the captaincy to Son.
AFP previously debunked false claims shared in videos from the same YouTube channel here and here involving manipulated footage and captions in interviews with Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp, aimed at stirring up anti-Chinese sentiment in South Korea.
Is there content that you would like AFP to fact-check? Get in touch.
Contact us
