Back when Alex Scott made his Guernsey debut versus Phoenix Sports in front of just 55 fans in 2019, his manager back then assured, “we haven’t seen the best from this youngster.”
That statement turned out to be a bit of an underestimation.
Now 22 years old and an established top-flight player with the Cherries, the playmaker has just received his maiden call-up to the senior England squad.
His ascent from eighth-tier talent to possible international star is a proper throwback, a journey rarely seen in the modern era.
Next stop? A major tournament?
“In my mind, there was zero possibility of making it as a professional football player, never mind featuring in the top division and representing the national team as well,” Scott stated in a recent interview.
“It has been a crazy five or six years of my life, and things have changed completely for myself and my loved ones.”
But in what way did Scott, referred to affectionately as the ‘Grealish from Guernsey’, find himself here?
Learning in the lower tiers
His path in football has been far from a conventional one.
He was part of four and a half years in the Saints’ youth system from the age of eight, leaving school early each Friday to fly from his island home on Guernsey to the mainland so he could train and play for the club’s academy sides.
Before he turned 13, though, they decided to let him go. The Cherries were willing to offer Scott an opportunity and he remained with them for a time, but, as he later admitted, his heart wasn’t fully committed.
Rather, he opted to remain on Guernsey and play for his local team.
“My form had dipped and flying over every week was starting to feel a bit too much,” he recalled.
“All I desired to chill at my home with my friends at weekends because I had missed nearly four and a half years of doing that. Getting that slice of childhood again was something I really required.
“Building some self-belief by coming back and taking part in island football was massive for me. It was probably one of the most important factors that got me to this point.”
When he was just 16, Scott made history as the youngest player in Guernsey’s history when he was introduced as a 57th-minute substitute in their league fixture at the opposition.
“I had trouble sleeping because I was figuring out how I could get him in the team because his talent is obvious,” Guernsey boss the coach stated back then.
“People have witnessed that – his possession of the ball is exceptional, the manner he carries the ball, he’s pure quality.”
Making a comeback to the professional game
Second-tier club the Robins – chaired by Guernsey resident Steve Lansdown – had been monitoring Scott’s development after an impressive beginning in men’s football and arranged a try-out in December 2019.
“It was chaos,” recalled the player. “The first day I joined the under-18s, the next day I was with the first team, which was a total surprise.
“On the Wednesday I played for his local side in London, travelled back and on the Friday, I played for the youth team and netted a hat-trick. From that point a done deal for me to put pen to paper on a contract.”
Within 18 months, even some way short of his 18th birthday, he was making his senior debut against Luton.
Scott made 83 league outings for the club while still a teenager, often being used as a wide defender – and sometimes in attack as a number 10 – such was his versatility and flexibility. Even at that young age and not in his natural role he was the standout performer.
Thanks to his skill to drive the ball forward, and with his socks down to his ankles, he earned the moniker ‘Guernsey’s Grealish’, a reference to City and national team playmaker Grealish.
At the end of the 2022-23 campaign he won the EFL Championship’s young player of the season honour, was chosen in the division’s team of the year and was voted the club’s player and young player of the Year.
“No doubt, I think he will represent his country and I’m sure he will progress to the pinnacle of the game,” Nigel Pearson, the player’s manager at Ashton Gate, remarked last year.
Less than three months after, he signed for the Cherries for a understood transfer fee of £25m.
Securing his major transfer
Scott endured a challenging debut campaign with the Cherries, waiting until October to make his top-flight debut after a knee problem in pre-season, and then finding himself inconsistent of the starting XI.
His second campaign was just as disrupted, this time by a knee operation which sidelined him for nearly several months.
“There was a decent run at the end of the previous campaign, which was nice to have, then I fractured my jaw,” said he.
“That felt like almost another setback and it was shaping up as a pretty bad year for the first five months.”
But he was then called up by the national team for the Under-21 European Championships – and managed to regain fitness for the tournament.
He went on to start five of the Young Lions’ six games as they claimed victory in the competition in the host nation, forming a strong partnership in the middle with Elliot Anderson, who in turn has gone on to impress for the senior side under the national coach.
And he has begun the current campaign equally as strongly for his club, playing in every game to help them to the top five in the standings.
“Representing the England senior team would be among the most special occasions of my life,” the player said recently.
“It’s down to me, I’ve got to continue developing as a player, keep enjoying the game, improving every day, and with luck I catch the eye of the national coach and get my chance.”
