Luis Binks: From Hotel Room to Scotland Debut

Luis Binks leans back among the palm trees at Scotland’s temporary base in La Manga and laughs as he tells it. Every footballer has a tale, but his veers into the surreal.

He is 25 now, captain of Brondby, and on the verge of a Scotland debut against Slovenia on Saturday. A vacancy has opened in the centre of Sebastien Pocognoli’s defence since Grant Hanley and John Souttar were cut loose when the Belgian replaced Steve Clarke. Binks, eligible through a grandparent from Dunbar, is one of eight uncapped players in this new-look squad.

Fresh faces. Fresh stories. His might be the wildest of the lot.

It starts in Montreal, in the early weeks of 2020. He had just walked away from Tottenham, the club he had grown up in, to throw himself into senior football with Montreal Impact in MLS.

"I'd been at Tottenham since I was very young, but I just wanted to go and play first football," he recalls. "That was my biggest thing, to not get caught up in the whole youth system. I feel that if you get caught in that, it's not real football. I wanted to test myself."

So he did. At 18, he crossed the Atlantic and landed in a dressing room run by Thierry Henry.

Then the world shut down.

"I'd signed in February and then we went into Covid lockdown in March," he says. "I hadn't yet found an apartment. I was in one hotel and Thierry was in another. The one I was in was then shut down.

"He was staying at the Ritz on his own. They wanted to move me to a hotel by the airport and I didn't want to go because there was nothing there. It felt like prison, almost. One day I get a call from him, saying: 'Do you want to move to where I am? You can go on the other floor'.

The Ritz-Carlton in Montreal. Five stars. 129 rooms. Two guests: Henry and an 18-year-old centre-half trying to make it.

"I'd go for runs in the morning and he'd be sat in the reception on his own," Binks says. "When I'd get back from the run, he'd still be sat there. I'd spend a few hours with him, just trying to pick his brains."

Days blurred into nights in an empty luxury hotel. Football chat filled the silence.

"I remember one night I was sat in my room just playing PlayStation and he rings me and goes, 'Do you want to get a pizza?' There's me and him driving around Montreal looking for a pizza. It's a bit surreal, but that was how it was."

He tells it now with a shrug, as if it were normal. It was anything but.

"I'm saying it now like it's just anybody, but there's a big aura around him. I was nervous at the time, but I asked him who's the best defender he's played with and against and why and it was a good time.

"It's a bit of a blur now, but I always remember him talking about Sol Campbell and just saying what made him great and how I could improve as a defender.

"I owe a lot to him because he gave me my first chance in senior football."

From late-night pizza runs with Thierry Henry in an empty Ritz-Carlton to fighting for a first Scotland cap in the Spanish sun, Binks’ journey has already taken a few sharp turns. Slovenia on Saturday could be the next.