Jose Mourinho has further elaborated regarding Troy Parrot's development with Spurs. Mourinho said at a press conference on Tuesday that the 18-year-old Dubliner will be on the bench when Spurs face Norwich in the FA Cup on Wednesday evening.
Though Spurs have been without Harry Kane and Son Heung-min, Parrott's chances this season have been limited. He made his second ever Premier League appearance on Sunday when he came off the bench to play three minutes of added time against Wolves.
Parrott subsequently the first half for the Spurs U23s on Monday night, scoring in the opening 10 minutes. Mourinho explained that Parrott's attitude in that game pleased him.
"So he needs to have his feet on the ground, we need to help him to have his feet on the ground," Mourinho told Football.London in an interview after his press conference on Tuesday.
To behave like a very young professional that has a career ahead of him, not as somebody in the last part of his career. There is an educational process.
For example, yesterday (Monday) I was so happy with the way he performed and I’m not speaking about the goal that he scored.
I told him before the game, every time you play with the kids of your age, you have to show your colleagues why you are the privileged one. Why you are training in the first-team every day and some of them are not – they are still in the group age, because it was something that he was not doing.
Every time he was playing with the kids, he was playing with the mentality of 'I shouldn't be here' or 'I am too good to be here' or 'It's not here that I want to play' and this is an educational process that comes.
Mourinho compared Parrott's situation to that of Scott McTominay when the Portuguese was Manchester United manager.
"I have no problem to say because I know that he will confirm," said Mourinho.
"I had exactly the same words with Scott McTominay. At the moment, he was not loved in his group age, because he was not with the right frame of mind.
"The moment we started changing that, lots of things started changing for him and every time he was going to the team, he was the best.
"He was the best in everything, the best in attitude, the best in character. This is the way you work with kids and if, in these generations, kids, they have things too easy in life, I think it’s part of the education to also see the other side.
"So I think Troy will come even stronger and stronger when everything happens step by step and not immediately, because he is not ready for immediately.
"It is a process. So tomorrow if he plays and he scores the winning goal, and he is the back page of your newspapers, nothing changes. The next week he goes again to play for the U23s. Everything is a process."
Picture credit: Sportsfile
