By Zak Williamson
There has been an emerging trend in football over the last few years of young Scottish talent being wooed away from playing in the Scottish Premiership to play abroad.
Whenever a new, exciting prospect emerges, it is only a matter of time before they are linked with a move to what many would consider greener pastures.
A prime example would be former Hearts fullback Aaron Hickey, who burst onto the scene in 2019 at just 17 years old, playing 33 games and becoming the youngest-ever player to play in a Scottish Cup Final.
After an outstanding debut season, Hickey was linked with many different clubs throughout the continent, eventually settling on a move to Italian Serie A side Bologna for a relatively low £1.5 million.
This is even after Hickey was linked with a move to Celtic, who reportedly tried to sign the young Scot on ‘5 or 6 different occasions.’
Speaking to the BBC, Hickey stated that his decision was influenced by the opportunity to play against some of the biggest names in Italian football at the time such as Cristiano Ronaldo and Paulo Dybala.
The move eventually paid off for the former Hearts man, as he was able to secure a dream £18 million move to Premier League side Brentford back in July.
This blueprint of Italian clubs signing young Scottish talent has continued in recent times with Aberdeen’s Lewis Ferguson and Hibernian’s Josh Doig securing moves to Bologna and Hellas Veronas respectively, costing the Italian sides £3 million each.
While it is undeniable that the Serie A is of a better standard than the Scottish Premiership in its current form, it still feels as if Scotland is getting the worse end of the deal.
Firstly, the prices commanded by the players are far too low. While the Scottish Premiership may not be among the richest in Europe, it still has players of considerable talent playing in it.
When Aaron Hickey’s fee to Brentford is compared to what Hearts received for him, there is a massive difference, almost 10 times less money than Bologna received for the player.
The current state of the Scottish game has led to clubs releasing their hottest young prospects for a fraction of what they are worth, accepting what is essentially pittance for players who could develop into real, world-class talent.
When questioned by Sky Sports about Serie A clubs’ sudden interest in Scottish talent, former Bologna scout Francesco Strozzi stated his belief that “the Scottish Premiership is an incredibly, incredibly underrated league,” and “it doesn’t have quite enough attention in the eyes of many scouting departments around the world.”
This shows that there are those who recognise how much of a goldmine the Scottish Premiership can be when it comes to young talent. The problem is that clubs from the Serie A are essentially taking advantage of the poor financial state of the Scottish League to turn over a profit.
Teams in Scotland will often be incentivised to accept offers far below the value of their key players due to the lack of financial backing received from the league itself, among other things such as poor tv deals.
One high-profile example of this would be the ‘cinch’ deal, which saw online car retailer company cinch become the main sponsor of the Scottish Premiership for 5 years back in 2021. The deal saw £1.6 million in sponsorship money shared between all 42 clubs in Scotland’s top 4 leagues.
This amounted to just £38,000 for each club. While it may be useful money to teams in the smaller leagues, this is an absurdly small amount for teams in the top flight and shows why teams jump at any chance to make money from player sales, even if the sale is way below the player’s worth.
While the cinch deal has recently been renegotiated to allow more finances to go to clubs in Scotland, it is still unlikely to make a huge difference when it comes to clubs in the top flight.
When looking at Scottish football today, it is hard to imagine that Celtic won the European Cup in 1967 with every player born within 30 miles of Celtic Park. Or that Rangers and Aberdeen won European trophies of their own in the 70s and 80s.
Although times have changed and the game has moved on, there appears to be a lack of belief in young prospects in Scotland, whether it be at the club level or international. Take former Rangers full-back, Nathan Patterson, as an example.
When playing for the Ibrox side as backup to James Tavernier, he was playing regular first-team football and even scoring a goal in the Europa League. Yet it took him a £12 million move to Premier League side Everton for him to become a regular starter for Steve Clarke’s Scotland.
A similar situation would be Liverpool’s Calvin Ramsey, who made his first start in the Champions League before receiving a call-up to the National Team.
Perhaps this puts things into perspective for why so many young players are looking to play outside of Scotland. It is the only way to receive the attention and recognition they deserve.
If top-level sides in England and Italy can see the worth of these players, then why can’t our national set-up do the same?
Teams in other countries are taking a chance on Scottish players who may have been thought of as ‘not good enough’ or ‘too young’ and giving them a chance to break into the first team.
They see the value in Scottish football, so perhaps the teams and governing bodies within Scottish should start doing the same and stop selling ourselves short at every opportunity.
