Tottenham striker Harry Kane broke out of a “slump”—two games without any goals—over the weekend, singlehandedly obliterating Burnley by scoring all three of his team’s goals. That hat trick tied the Premier League’s greatest ever scorer, Alan Shearer, for his record of 36 goals in a calendar year, set in 1995.
It didn’t take Kane long to break that record in his final game of 2017 today. Twenty minutes into the match against Southampton, Danny Rose was fouled just outside the box, allowing Christian Eriksen to find Kane on the goal line for a tap-in header.
He didn’t stop there, adding goals in the 39th and 67th minutes to help get the 5-2 victory and his sixth Premier League hat trick of 2017. Kane also moved ahead of Lionel Messi as Europe’s leading scorer of the year, getting 56 to Messi’s 54 in all competitions. And he did it in only 52 appearances, which is 11 fewer than Messi.