Tottenham youngster staying grounded despite huge hype in homeland

It is not often that a 17-year-old gets picked to represent his country at the U-21 level but that has exactly what has happened to Tottenham striker Troy Parrott. The forward who was FAI Under-16s Player of the Year for 2018 was called up to the Ireland U-21 squad by coach Stephen Kelly on Sunday.

Unfortunately, Parrot had to withdraw from the squad due to injury concerns. The youngster has been recovering from a toe injury, which required a small operation five weeks ago.

The Irishman has had a stellar season at Spurs having scored 11 goals and assisted 3 others in just 7 matches for the U-18s this year. He has also found the back of the net 3 times in 5 games for Spurs U-19s so far this campaign.

Pochettino has asked the youngster to train with the first team on several occasions this season and the Argentine even named him in the squad that traveled to the Camp Nou earlier this season to face Barcelona.

Parrot’s performances for Tottenham’s and Ireland’s youth teams haven’t gone unnoticed in his home country as many now regard him to be the nation’s next goalscoring hope.

However, the Tottenham man insists that he is not paying too much attention to the hype, and is instead just focussed on improving.

Speaking to the Irish Sun, Parrot said, “I try not to take any notice to be honest. I just try to keep on doing what I do and stuff like that. Everybody tells me that people are talking about me but I don’t really take notice.

“Obviously it’s good to have stuff like that, it makes you want to do better, I suppose. You sort of don’t even see how fast it is going.

“But I’ll just keep taking things in my stride and hopefully keep progressing. I wouldn’t be with the Spurs first team if I wasn’t capable of training and stuff like that. It’s a good experience and you adapt very quickly.

“When you go from playing in Ireland, from a non-professional team to a professional one, obviously you see changes straight away, between the diet and the gym work. I’ve got massively better since I’ve moved to England, working with better coaches and all of that.”

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