Harry Kane had to watch helplessly while recovering from surgery as Tottenham’s Champions League qualification hopes slipped away.

It looked like Kane’s season was over — until the Premier League was suspended for three months. Now, at a time when the striker expected to be playing for England at the European Championship, he is back scoring for Spurs.

On his 200th Premier League appearance, Kane scored his first goal of 2020 — after Tomas Soucek’s own goal — to complete a 2-0 victory over West Ham on Tuesday, moving Tottenham within a point of the Champions League places.

“When you have been out it’s just getting that feeling back on the pitch,” said Kane, who moved to 137 league goals overall. “You can train as much as you want but being out here is totally different.”

So very different, these days. For one, there were no fans in the stadium. Group celebrations are also prohibited. So there was only a solo slide across the field, and Erik Lamela was briefly going to jump on Kane’s back before withdrawing.

It was Lamela who gained possession inside his own half to launch the counterattack that ended with Son Heung-min releasing the ball and Kane racing through the porous defence before striking into the net in the 82nd minute.

Aguero surgery

Manchester City’s Aguero underwent knee surgery in Barcelona on Wednesday and said the operation had gone well.

“Everything went well, and I’ll soon begin recovery,” Aguero said on Twitter with a photograph of himself lying in a hospital bed.

Rakitic scores

Barcelona midfielder Ivan Rakitic scored his first goal of the season to give his side a 1-0 win at home to Athletic Bilbao on Thursday, averting a second successive draw which would have further dented the champions’ La Liga title defence.

Barca had slipped off the top of the table after Friday’s 0-0 draw at Sevilla.

The win took Barca temporarily to the top of the standings on 68 points.