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McTominay's rise from Blackpool to Barcelona

Reserves coach Warren Joyce fielded the midfielder as a lone striker in a Lancashire Senior Cup tie at Blackpool a little over three short years ago. The pitch was terrible, the game was not much better and it was a stereotypical battle against physical lower-league opposition.

In terms of senior football, it was possibly as far removed from confronting Lionel Messi and Barcelona’s footballing artists on a pleasantly sunny evening in the quarter-finals of the Champions League as you could get. Scott scored the winner, from close range, and took the knocks in an unfamiliar role.

Later, he would tell me: “I was not too pleased with how I played.