Getty ImagesScotland legend Joe Jordan believes Scott McTominay is playing the best football of his career with Napoli, and is thriving under the pressure of playing for the Serie A club.
The 28-year-old made headlines with an impressive double in Napoli’s 3-0 win over Empoli on Monday as he continued to catch the eye in his debut season in Italy.
The Scotland midfielder opened the scoring with a powerful low shot from outside the area after a surging run, then headed in Napoli’s third off the underside of the bar. McTominay was only denied a hat-trick by the width of the post but took all the plaudits as the stand-out player on the night.
Jordan made the switch to Italy from Manchester United in his own playing career, spending two years with Milan, and he has been impressed with how McTominay has adapted to playing overseas.
“It’s not an easy thing to go to a new team, and obviously as you’re doing that, to learn the language,” the former international forward told STV.
“And I think Napoli is a place where if you’re a football player and doing well, you’re idolised there.
“So that again, it’s nice to know that he’s handled the amount of attention he’ll be getting because that’s not affected this game. You still see him working as hard in the game without the ball.
“At this moment in time I would say he’s playing as well as he’s played in his career.
“When you take into consideration he’s gone to a different way of life, really. In Italy, they love their football players. And you’ve got to accept that your private life, the hours are few and far between because they want to see the players, they love their players, especially when they are fighting to win the Scudetto.
“Scott has scored goals and a couple of weeks ago he was on the front page of Gazetta Della Sport’s magazine.
“He’s a bit of a star.
“It doesn’t surprise me. He gets forward in the box and he’s scoring goals, which has brought highlights to his game. He has done well.”
McTominay isn’t the only one of Steve Clarke’s Scotland squad who is impressing in Serie A, with his teammate Billy Gilmour and Bologna’s Lewis Ferguson also starring regularly. Jordan believes that might convince other sides in the league to start recruiting Scottish talent.
“There are others, they have played well,” he said. “I think it’s all credit to someone like Ferguson, who has done really well.
“He got a bad injury and he was playing exceptionally well before he got injured. And then he got an injury and now he’s back from that and he’s picked it up again.
“You know he’s a lad in form. And I think when they’ve seen that and him being a Scot, I think it’s maybe encouraging people from other teams to go and look at the Scottish players.
“I’m glad to share that the players have come, they’ve all done well. You know, they have given the team something and they’ve played consistently.
“It’s good to see that and it gives the manager of the Scotland team an opportunity to have a selection of players that are playing week in, week out.”
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