Troy Parrott explains what he found difficult at Tottenham after £6.7m summer transfer

Former Tottenham striker Troy Parrott has made quite the impact for AZ Alkmaar since his arrival over the summer

Troy Parrott has opened up on challenges of trying to break into the Tottenham first team following his summer move to AZ Alkmaar.

The 22-year-old Republic of Ireland international moved to the Eredivisie side in a £6.7million deal with the north London club inserting a 20% sell-on clause into the transfer, football.london understands. Spurs sanctioned the move after Parrott enjoyed a successful season-long loan in the Netherlands, with the striker netting 17 goals for struggling Excelsior Rotterdam as they slipped to relegation from the Dutch top flight.

Parrott has already scored six goals for AZ Alkmaar this season, four of them in a 9-1 Eredivisie demolition of Heerenveen, and rubbed shoulders with some of the continent’s big boys in last Thursday’s 2-0 Europa League defeat at Athletic Bilbao. He had been tipped for big things in north London after making his Premier League debut for Spurs as a 17-year-old in December 2019, but appearances were limited and the striker was sent out on a number of loans.

Now, ahead of Ireland’s Nations League clashes with Finland and Greece, Parrott admitted the chance to learn his trade without the scrutiny under which he was placed in England is a welcome relief. “I was younger – I’ll tell the truth, it used to get to me a bit," he said.

“But now I am older, I have played more games, I have been in England and the Netherlands and am experiencing new things, so being away, it’s not necessarily being out of the spotlight, it’s just a new experience for me I’m really enjoying.”

Parrott joined Tottenham back in 2017 as a 15-year-old from Irish side Belvedere and despite plenty of high hopes for his ability he was only able to make four appearances for the first team. He spent five loan spells away from the club at Millwall, Ipswich, MK Dons and Preston with varying degrees of success in the Football League until that loan in the Eredivisie with Excelsior last season really kicked on his career.

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Asked how the pressure had affected him, he said: “Trying to live up to the hype at such a young age. It was never going to happen that early because football isn’t so easy. For me it was more about growing up a bit and trying to block out the noise.”

Parrott scored his first senior Ireland goals – two of them – in a 4-1 friendly victory over Andorra in June 2021, but has not added substantially to his tally since with Ireland struggling for positive results during Stephen Kenny’s reign, which drew to a close in November last year. Asked if his country had seen the best of him yet, he said: “Me, personally? No, I don’t think so.

“I’ve had some good moments in the Ireland shirt to date. But to answer the question, no, you’ve not seen the best of me.”

Parrott is now hoping he can really kickstart his international career, with Ireland facing the Finns on Thursday, before heading to Athens on Sunday after back-to-back defeats by England and the Greeks in new boss Heimir Hallgrimsson’s first camp last month.

He said: “It’s been a difficult couple of campaigns for us in terms of results and quality of group opponents," Parrott said. "The last group was Netherlands and France, world-class countries. It’s on us to try turn it around and start picking up results more regularly to get back to where we want to be.”

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