When Alex Scott made his local team debut versus Phoenix Sports before just 55 fans in 2019, his coach at the time assured, “we haven’t seen the best from this boy.”
This prediction turned out to be something of an underestimation.
Now aged 22 and a Premier League regular with Bournemouth, the midfielder has just received his first call-up to the full England team.
His rise from eighth-tier talent to potential international star is a true blast from the past, a journey seldom seen in the modern game.
What’s next? A major tournament?
“In my mind, there was no chance of making it as a professional football player, never mind featuring in the top division and playing for the national team as well,” Scott said in a recent interview.
“It’s been a crazy five or six years of my life, and circumstances have changed drastically for myself and my loved ones.”
So how did Alex Scott, known affectionately as the ‘Guernsey Grealish’, find himself here?
Learning in the lower tiers
His football journey has not been a typical one.
He spent four and a half years in the Saints’ youth system from the age of eight, skipping school each Friday to travel by air from his home on Guernsey to the south coast so he could train and feature for the club’s academy sides.
Prior to his 13th birthday, however, they decided to let him go. Bournemouth were willing to offer Scott an option and he remained with them for a time, but, by the player’s own admission, his mind wasn’t fully committed.
Rather, he chose to remain on Guernsey and play for his local team.
“My form had dipped and traveling weekly was starting to feel overwhelming,” he recalled.
“All I desired to chill at my home with my mates at weekends because I had missed nearly four and a half years of doing that. To have that slice of childhood again was something I definitely needed.
“Building some confidence by returning and taking part in local football was massive for me. That proved to be perhaps the most crucial factors that got me to this point.”
At the age of 16, the teenager became the youngest player in the club’s records when he was introduced as a second-half replacement in their league match at Phoenix Sports.
“I’ve been having trouble sleeping because I was trying to work out how I could include him in the team because he’s that good,” manager the coach commented back then.
“People have witnessed that – his retention of the ball is outstanding, the manner he runs with the ball, he’s pure quality.”
Returning to the pro ranks
Second-tier club Bristol City – owned by islander Steve Lansdown – had been monitoring Scott’s early progress after an impressive beginning in men’s football and gave him a try-out in December 2019.
“The whole experience was hectic,” recalled Scott. “The first day I trained with the youth team, the next day I trained with the senior squad, which was a total shock.
“Midweek I featured for his local side in London, returned home and by Friday, I played for Bristol City Under-18s and scored a hat-trick. It was almost a certainty for me to put pen to paper on a deal.”
In just a year and a half, still some way short of his 18th birthday, he was making his first-team debut against the Hatters.
Scott made 83 league appearances for the Robins while still a teenager, often being deployed as a wing-back – and occasionally further forward as a number 10 – such was his adaptability and flexibility. Even at that young age and playing out of position he was the standout performer.
With his skill to drive the ball up the pitch, and with his socks rolled down to his ankles, he picked up the moniker ‘the Guernsey Grealish’, a reference to Manchester City and England attacking midfielder Jack Grealish.
At the end of the 2022-23 campaign he won the EFL Championship’s young player of the season award, was chosen in the league’s team of the year and was named Bristol City’s top player and top youngster.
“No doubt, I believe he will represent his country and I think he’ll go on to the pinnacle of the sport,” his former manager, the player’s boss at Ashton Gate, stated previously.
Within 90 days after, he joined the Cherries for a understood fee of £25m.
Getting his big move
The midfielder experienced a difficult first season with the Cherries, having to wait until October to earn his top-flight debut after a knee injury in pre-season, and then finding himself in and out of the team.
His following season was just as disrupted, this time by a knee operation which sidelined him for nearly several months.
“There was quite a good run at the close of the previous campaign, which was nice to have, then I broke my jaw,” explained Scott.
“It was almost another setback and it was shaping up as a pretty bad start for the first five months.”
But he was then called up by the national team for the U21 Euros – and managed to regain fitness for the tournament.
He went on to start five of the England U21s’ six games as they claimed victory in the competition in the host nation, forming a formidable partnership in midfield with Elliot Anderson, who himself has excelled for the first team under Thomas Tuchel.
And he has begun the current campaign just as impressively for his club, featuring in all matches to help them to fifth in the standings.
“Representing the England senior team would be among the most special occasions of my career,” the player said earlier this season.
“The responsibility is mine, I’ve got to continue developing as a footballer, keep enjoying the game, improving every day, and hopefully I impress the England manager and get my chance.”
