I played with Harry Kane at Tottenham but starlet with ‘aura’ who scored hat-trick against Barcelona had everything

Tottenham are currently tasked with finding a successor to Harry Kane — but they once had a striker waiting in the wings who promised to be even better.

Shaq Coulthirst came through the Spurs academy system at a similar time to the England captain and once trod a similar path.

Coulthirst, one year Kane's junior, announced himself with a hat-trick as Tottenham's Under-19 side thrashed a Barcelona side featuring Adama Traore 4-1 in 2012.

His form in the NextGen Series, youth football’s then-version of the Champions League, reportedly caught the eyes of the Spanish giants and their rivals Real Madrid.

And just a year after his European treble, the teenager was making his senior Spurs debut in a 4-1 Europa League win against Anzhi Makhachkala, with an unproven Kane missing out through injury.

Burnley goalkeeper Lawrence Vigouroux, who was in the Tottenham youth set-up at the same time, lifted the lid on Coulthirst.

During an exclusive interview with talkSPORT.com earlier this year, Vigouroux said: «In the year above we had Harry Kane, Alex Pritchard, Ryan Fredericks.

»We had a player, Shaquile Coulthirst, he played for the first team a few times he was unbelievable. Unbelievable, youth team, unbelievable, Under-21s and then he had a couple of really bad injuries."

Vigouroux added: «He was honestly one of the best players that was there at the time and had a real aura — a presence about him, captain of the youth team.

»And then came up and played really young for the 21s team.

«Someone that, without the injuries, who knows what would have happened with him?

»Because he had everything going for him."

A post shared by Shaq Coulthirst (@shaqcoulthirst)

A month after Coulthirst's Tottenham debut, he even followed Kane's path by joining