Germany do not have a single player among the 30 in the running to win the Ballon d’Or in London on Monday night – but Bayern Munich do have England captain Harry Kane.

For the 35-time German champions, the award is perhaps even more important than it is for the peerless striker himself. The Bayern hierarchy are planning to travel to the Palladium Theatre en masse to support Kane.

Kane is not only Bayern’s top striker, he is their international figurehead and, internally, their poster-boy professional. Club patron and honorary president Uli Hoeness described the England captain as the best signing in the club’s history. Hoeness even went so far as to say he loves Kane, and he is not alone in this.

Hoeness is one of many in the club’s leadership who have been endlessly promoting Kane to help the 33-year-old fulfil his lifelong dream of winning the trophy. Bayern officials have been campaigning on his behalf for weeks.

First up was manager Vincent Kompany, who remains in hospital for tests after collapsing at Bayern’s training ground on Friday. Kompany said: “If he can now crown his career or his season with the Ballon d’Or, that would be fitting given the way he plays for the team.”

The plaudits kept coming. Whether it was sporting director Max Eberl (“He has more than earned the Ballon d’Or. Anyone who loves football loves characters like Harry Kane”), chief executive Jan-Christian Dreesen (“One thing is clear – anyone talking about this year’s greatest individual honours cannot overlook Harry Kane”) or president Herbert Hainer (“Harry Kane embodies the idea that sporting greatness is incomplete without greatness of character. He would be a worthy World Footballer of the Year”), everyone at the club is fighting for Kane.

And with good reason. The club have experienced a number of disappointments at the Ballon d’Or. In 2013, Bayern won the treble for the first time in their history, with Franck Ribéry in outstanding form. The fact the Frenchman did not win the main individual gong that year is still regarded as one of the award’s most controversial omissions.

Ribéry later described the result as a “robbery” and a “political decision”. Originally, the deadline for submitting votes was November 15, 2013. At that point, Ribéry was the clear favourite with the bookmakers. Shortly after the official deadline, Fifa – who at the time presented the award jointly with magazine France Football – extended the voting period, completely out of the blue, by two weeks until November 29.

The official reason given was a low turnout. However, the World Cup play-off matches fell precisely within this new timeframe, where Cristiano Ronaldo then single-handedly propelled Portugal to the tournament with four goals – including a spectacular hat-trick against Sweden. This influenced many voters, who were even allowed to change the votes they had already cast.

The disappointment was even greater, however, in the case of Robert Lewandowski. Bayern felt let down on two occasions. In 2020, they won the treble for the second time and it was the most successful year of Lewandowski’s career. The striker scored 55 goals in competitive matches and was the top scorer in all three competitions. He was considered the undisputed favourite but France Football decided to cancel the 2020 awards ceremony because of the Covid pandemic.

Its rationale was that, because of the suspension of some leagues, there had not been sufficient matches for a fair assessment. Fifa took a different view. Lewandowski was named World Footballer of the Year by the world governing body, but the striker was denied the Ballon d’Or. The magazine later refused to hold a belated presentation ceremony.

In 2021, Lewandowski embarked on his next historic quest. With 41 goals that season, he broke the 49-year-old Bundesliga record set by German legend Gerd Müller. This was followed once again by bitter disappointment: in the Ballon d’Or vote, Lewandowski finished second behind Lionel Messi. Just under 16 per cent of the 170 journalists eligible to vote did not include Lewandowski in their top five but Messi won by a narrow margin, scoring 613 points to Lewandowski’s 580.

Speaking on stage at the gala, Messi said to Lewandowski that he absolutely deserved the award. This was a major blow to Bayern’s reputation. It confirmed Lewandowski’s belief that he did not receive international attention playing in the Bundesliga, which was needed to stand a chance of winning the ultimate individual prize. He submitted a transfer request and left Bayern a year later, in the summer of 2022, to join Barcelona.

Last season, Kane scored an outstanding 73 goals in 65 competitive matches for Bayern and England, with 61 of those for his club. This puts him in second place in the all-time rankings since the turn of the millennium. Only one player has ever done better: Messi set the record of 82 goals in 69 competitive games during the 2011-12 season. For this, he was awarded the Ballon d’Or in 2012. Ronaldo has won the Ballon d’Or five times, without ever matching Kane’s tally of 73 goals.

What would it mean for Kane not to be honoured despite this record-breaking season? How would he rate the Bundesliga’s appeal? And might this even have consequences for his contract extension talks at Bayern?

Bayern are not just fighting for Kane in this vote, they are also fighting for their own image and for the Bundesliga, which is often derided as the “Farmers’ League” – a league in which future stars such as Erling Haaland or Jude Bellingham get playing time, but will not reach their peak.

A triumph for Kane would therefore also be a victory for Bayern, one that would set the tone for the future. It would send a signal to players like Michael Olise that he does not have to succumb to the temptations of a club like Real Madrid to be recognised as the best player in the world.

Kane is in the running to win the trophy for England for the first time since Michael Owen in 2001. For Germany, the Bundesliga and, above all, Bayern, a victory for Kane is even more important.