The permanence of Harry Kane’s open mouth is paramount to his unfathomable rate of goal-scoring, the scientific community has claimed.

PLUS! THERE’S MORE: The best Harry Kane England jokes and hype as international career starts with a goal

England went totally and uncharacteristically ape for the Tottenham Hotspur striker when he scored his first England goal within seconds after coming on as a substitute to make his full international debut in Friday’s 4-0 win over Lithuania.

The goal was Kane’s 30th of the season in all competitions, a total which has already had some Spurs fans questioning whether their games of Football Manager have somehow bled into real life.

It has also sparked a spate of research from geeky, bespectacled science types keen to nail down the precise origin of Kane’s increasingly supernatural-seeming ability – and now the results are in.

Speaking exclusively to Football Burp, one of the aforementioned geeks explained how Harry Kane’s open mouth is conducive to potentially unprecedented numbers of goals.

She said: “Most players have their mouth open only some of the time, for example when they’re yelling something, eating chicken and pasta or even just breathing through it.

“Some players have their mouth open none of the time, although this is much rarer. We’re thinking Paul Scholes during his playing career here, before he ruined it all by prising open the manhole cover as a pundit and unleashing a tide of tedium.

“Harry Kane is unique in that his mouth is open all of the time, and our extensive research appears to confirm that this surplus flow of oxygen into his body is responsible for his utterly insane record of late.

“There’s also the ‘lulling opponents into a false sense of security’ aspect of it, whereby his simpleton’s visage reassures defenders that they’re not up against some kind of footballing nonpareil, which of course they are.

“But it’s mostly the oxygen thing.”

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