Lennon Miller joins Udinese: From the Scottish Premiership to Serie A – the rise of the Scotland midfielder as he departs Motherwell

Lennon Miller is the newest Scotland export to Italy as he swaps the Scottish Premiership for Serie A.

{The teenager} has signed a five-year take care of Udinese after securing a membership report switch payment for Motherwell of round £4.7m, together with potential add-ons.

He made 76 appearances for the Steelmen, captained them final season and made his Scotland debut in June – he has already achieved greater than most footballers by 18.

The place the journey began

Miller’s obsession began from an early age – largely because of his father, Lee, who was additionally knowledgeable footballer.

He performed for the likes of Aberdeen, Hearts, and Middlesbrough, and says his son’s love of the sport was clear to see right away.

“He must have only been months old when he started kicking a ball about. Every time he had a football he would get excited about it and it just continued from there,” he advised Sky Sports activities.

“He was six days outdated once I signed with Aberdeen, which makes you’re feeling outdated, however his mum religiously took him to each sport that I used to be concerned in and he simply centered on the sport.

“He studied the game from a very early age and obviously took to it and loved it. I remember when he was four, and I was down at Middlesbrough, and I made him a corner flag because he wanted to hit corners. We dug it in the grass and he used to ping corners in, he just loved it from day one.

“Lennon misplaced his mum when he was 5. They had been actually shut, performed a lot collectively and it was laborious, however now we now have such a powerful connection and he is obtained such a powerful assist community round him.

“Football’s always been the thing that takes him away from all the tragedy and all the kind of thoughts. Once he’s on that training pitch or on that football pitch for games, he blocks out everything that’s happened in his life because it’s a massive tragedy at such a young age.”

‘Miller was totally different to each different participant’

Motherwell legend James McFadden is aware of a factor or two about catching the attention in North Lanarkshire earlier than transferring on to greater issues, having switched to Everton in 2003 for £1.25million.

The Sky Sports activities pundit lined up with Lee for the nationwide workforce and has a son who performed alongside Lennon. That every one quantities to McFadden having saved a very shut eye on the Udinese midfielder’s growth.

“My son and Lennon are the same age, so they played against each other at, five, six years old at the Funfours. Any parent out there will know what the Funfours is like, it’s normally absolute carnage and Lennon stood out like a sore thumb,” he stated.

“He was taller than a lot of the boys, but most are doing cartwheels, picking their nose, looking the other way. Some kids are not even that interested, which is fine, but Lennon had unbelievable talent, it seemed effortless.

“The identical boy that the Motherwell followers obtained to see, it’s the similar stuff you had been seeing again then – dropping a shoulder and pinging the ball.

“He was different to every single player on that pitch.”

McFadden’s not the one different Motherwell academy graduate to herald a powerful switch payment – David Turnbull swapped claret and amber for the inexperienced and white of Celtic in a then membership report payment of £3.25m in 2020.

‘He caught out like a sore thumb’

Stuart Ogilvie spent many years scouting for Motherwell and has seen all of them up shut. He additionally knew Miller was particular the very first time he laid eyes on him.

“When he was playing with Cambusnethan Talbot, it was down at a primary school in Uddingston and he was playing against Newlands Boys Club,” Oglivie added.

“The first thing that I noticed was everything was all hurry scurry about him, but he was so composed on the ball.

“His head was up, he was searching for the move, you already know, he caught out like a sore thumb.

“It was seven a side, he was in the same midfield with Bailey Rice, two of the best players in Scotland at that age group and the two of them just kicked on together, so much so after 18 months or so we started to play them up an age group to challenge them even more and the two boys handled it terrifically.”

Though the hype was there from an early age, Scottish soccer has been plagued by promising children who did not fairly make the breakthrough to first-team stage.

Stevie Hammell made Lennon Motherwell’s youngest ever participant when he subbed him on in a 2022 League Cup tie in opposition to Inverness Caledonian Thistle aged 16 years and 6 days.

Managerial change adopted two months later, which means it was beneath Stuart Kettlewell the place the midfielder actually began to flourish within the beginning XI.

“We knew very quickly that Lennon was going to play,” Kettlewell stated.

“You’re never sure how consistent that will be or will it be for the full season, but through the pre-season of his initial year of being a regular, we just felt he was head and shoulders above the rest with such talent and maturity.

“There’s many different ways of having an impact on a team and sometimes people look at it and you shout, you bawl, you scream, I think very much Lennon’s talent was his influence on the pitch.”

Miller’s transfer to Udinese comes after months of hypothesis over his future and discuss of big-money strikes.

His dad insists the hypothesis has by no means been a problem, along with his son remaining centered on the job in hand – making an attempt to impress for membership and nation.

“All he wants to do is play football, yes he’s got ambition to play at the highest level but he knows how hard it is to get there and there’s a journey for him to get there.

“Hopefully, we may help him inside that and he is aware of what path he needs to go in.”