Bundesliga
Bayern Munich and England striker Harry Kane saw off competition from Willi Orbán, Ritsu Dōan, Tom Rothe, Vincenzo Grifo and Tim Kleindienst to win October's Player of the Month award.
The Player of the Month award was created by the DFL Deutsche Fußball Liga in 2018/19, in cooperation with the Bundesliga's official licensing partner, EA Sports.
The award is decided through a two-stage selection process that considers both the players' individual performance data and a vote by fans and experts.
This month, the selections were made based on performances from Matchdays 6, 7 and 8, with Kane taking the prize.
October winner
Harry Kane had not scored for four consecutive Bundesliga matches prior to Bayern’s eagerly anticipated Matchday 7 clash with fellow high-fliers VfB Stuttgart. Yet it ended up being a one-sided contest as the 31-year-old scored a hat-trick in a 4-0 win, even impressing VfB forward Deniz Undav: “Respect. He hadn’t scored for four games and then he let it all out on us. He’s a world-class striker. All you can do is doff your hat.”
Kane was on target again on Matchday 8 in Bochum to take his October goal tally to four, a league-high alongside Borussia Mönchengladbach’s Tim Kleindienst. The quality of the England international’s finishing is underlined by the fact he needed just 13 attempts to register those four goals, giving him an incredible shots-to-goals ratio.
“He’s always hungry, you can even see that in training,” said Bayern head coach Vincent Kompany. He carries that onto the pitch at the weekend – regardless of whether opposing players appeal to his better nature or not. “Stop scoring against us,” Undav said to Kane in the mixed zone after Bayern’s win over Stuttgart. “Sorry bro,” was the reply, ice cold and efficient as ever.
Watch: Harry Kane nominated for October Player of the Month
The other nominees
RB Leipzig are hot on the heels of Bundesliga leaders FC Bayern München, yet while Vincent Kompany’s side have garnered headlines for their goalscoring prowess, it is at the other end of the pitch that Leipzig have excelled. Marco Rose’s side have conceded a league-low five goals after nine matchdays, with SC Freiburg the only team to score against them in all of October, taking the team’s clean-sheet tally to six. Much of that is down to team captain and defensive rock Willi Orbán, who did not miss a minute of Bundesliga action throughout the month.
“Willi is only human, but he’s very close to being a machine,” said Rose after the Freiburg game of the 31-year-old, who maintains his fitness thanks to a specially tailored sleep and nutrition regime. Leipzig initially struggled against a strong Freiburg side, but Orbán’s equaliser turned the tide and set the course for a 3-1 victory. That was the centre-back’s second goal of the season; his first also arrived in October, while he scored in back-to-back Bundesliga games for the first time in his lengthy career.
Despite his impact in the final third, the Hungary international has not forgotten how to do his day job. He won 76 percent of all his duels in October, the second-best quota in the division after FC St. Pauli’s Eric Smith. Rose may have been joking about his captain being a machine, but on October’s evidence he was not too far from the truth.
Watch: Willi Orbán nominated for October Player of the Month
Alongside Union Berlin, SC Freiburg have been one of the surprise packages of the season. If there were any doubts as to how the team would perform under new coach Julian Schuster following the departure of Christian Streich, the Black Forest outfit have unequivocally laid them to rest. Ritsu Dōan is the perfect embodiment of the positivity of the new era. While the Japanese midfielder’s extraordinary attacking talents have long been well known, he has added a ruthless edge in front of goal this term.
The agile right-winger scored two of his four Bundesliga goals this season in October and provided the assist for another. In fact, he was directly involved in a goal on each of the three Bundesliga matchdays across the month.
Is Dōan in the form of his life? “I can’t answer that because I haven’t known him that long,” said Schuster when the question was put to him, but he was not shy in showering the 26-year-old with praise: “He studies players who play in his position, but at a higher level than him. We talk things over and show him some clips. This joint effort, coupled with him putting the team first and doing the basics perfectly, make it possible for him to perform so consistently.”
It is clearly bearing fruit: After just nine matchdays, Dōan is only three goals away from equalling his single-season personal best. In addition to his new-found efficiency in front of goal, the attacker has retained his strength in the tackle, winning a superb 62 percent of the 78 duels he contested in October – the latter figure representing the third-highest amount in the Bundesliga. Will that be enough for him to win this month’s vote?
Watch: Ritsu Dōan nominated for October Player of the Month
After several years of on-field success, Union Berlin struggled in 2023/24. They appear to have learned their lessons, however, and rebuilt the team over the summer, making Tom Rothe one of the cornerstones of the side despite the sum of his Bundesliga experience amounting to 118 minutes with Borussia Dortmund. Union took a shine to the 20-year-old on the basis of his performances in helping Holstein Kiel earn promotion from in Bundesliga 2 last term. Still, the full-back was unproven at the top level, but Union’s risk in recruiting him has certainly paid off.
The left-footer has been in the starting line-up for seven of nine matchdays, impressing both in attack and defence as a left wing-back. He supplied plenty of evidence of that on Matchday 7 against Kiel, of all teams, when he scored one and set up the other in a 2-0 win over his former club. Those two direct goal involvements made him Union’s most potent attacking outlet in October, even if head coach Bo Svensson is keen not to get too carried away with praise for the youngster: “He’s on the right track, but the path is long and he still has a way to go.” Union club president Dirk Zingler is convinced that that path can take Rothe to the very top: “I’ve no doubt that Tom will be the left-back in Germany’s national team in the future.” His displays in October leave little room for argument.
Watch: Tom Rothe nominated for October Player of the Month
Vincenzo Grifo (Freiburg)
It is often thought that footballers over the age of 30 start to decline physically. However, Freiburg’s evergreen Vincenzo Grifo – now in his ninth season at the club – is proof that is not always the case. If anything, the 31-year-old playmaker’s performances have improved according to Schuster: “In terms of athleticism, Vince has taken a step forward. He’s added to his game. We really need that from him.”
Schuster’s observations are supported by the statistics. Grifo has covered an average of 11.6 kilometres per match, a distance only beaten among the nominees by Rothe (12.1 km), who is 11 years his junior. Grifo’s 82 touches per 90 minutes are more than any of the other candidates. And he has maintained his efficiency too, contributing one goal and a league-best three assists to the five goals Freiburg scored in October. As such, Grifo was directly involved in a goal every 55 minutes last month, a quota not even Kane (58 minutes) could match. Age is therefore clearly just a number for the four-time Italy international.
Watch: Vincenzo Grifo nominated for October Player of the Month
Tim Kleindienst (Borussia Mönchengladbach)
As strange as it might sound, Kleindienst and Kane have a number of things in common. For starters, both strikers scored four goals from 13 attempts in the Bundesliga in October. And by contrast to Kane, who fired a blank on Matchday 6, Kleindienst found the net in every game last month. Such statistics underline just how well the Foals’ summer signing from Heidenheim has started at the club. So good has the 29-year-old been, in fact, that he made his senior debut for Germany in October.
Being involved in the national set-up clearly benefitted the forward, who subsequently scored against both Heidenheim and Mainz. “He brought that self-confidence onto the pitch with his energy, his work ethic, his danger in front of goal,” said sporting director Roland Virkus after the victory over Heidenheim. “He did so much for the team.”
Despite now being a fully fledged Germany international, Kleindienst remains very much a team player: he contested a league-high 92 duels in October. His combination of tireless work and goal threat could well mean he receives another call-up to the Germany squad – perhaps even as reigning Player of the Month.
Watch: Tim Kleindienst nominated for October Player of the Month
Previous winners
September 2024
Omar Marmoush (Eintracht Frankfurt)