Rocco Vata M Watford b.2005

Starting a thread for Rocco Vata, son of former Celtic right back an ex-Albanian international Rudi Vata. Rudi married a Scottish woman while playing for Celtic and on the basis of her mother, Rocco's grandmother, being born in Ireland he is eligible for ourselves in addition to Scotland, Albania and Montenegro. We seem to have gotten to him first and he's been playing in Ireland's underage setup.

Rocco just turned 15 in April but was already involved in Celtic's U18s last year and has gotten off to a strong start for Celtic's new B team which is playing against senior adult sides in the Scottish Lowland League (equivalent of Conference National in the English Pyramid). Both Celtic and Rangers have had B sides admitted on a pilot basis with teams limited to U20 players who have made less than 5 appearances for the senior team that season. Celtic have taken 7 points from 12 so far so it isn't proving to be a cake walk. The equivalent quality level might be LOI 1st Div or LSL. Notwithstanding the quality it says something about him to be holding his own against adults at barely 15. He's scored two in his last two. One to watch for the future. Hopefully he won't switch allegiances at some point.

That all sounds terribly depressing to me.

As much as we've used the granny rule to our advantage, surely we can field a team of Irish-born players going forward

Seriously. 'The we've gotten to him first bit' say it all.

I'm not having a go at you Poor Student just why would the FAI bother recruiting 14 year olds from aboard with tenuous links to Ireland?!

I rather they put there time and effort into developing players in Ireland.

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Originally Posted by kennedmc

Seriously. 'The we've gotten to him first bit' say it all.

I'm not having a go at you Poor Student just why would the FAI bother recruiting 14 year olds from aboard with tenuous links to Ireland?!

I rather they put there time and effort into developing players in Ireland.

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They can do both. We are assuming a lot. I mean James McCarthy’s grandfather asked him on his deathbed to play for ireland such was his passion for the country. For all we know, Rocco’s grandmother has distilled that sense of irishness into her kids and grandkids. You can’t assume because someone’s a second gen that they don’t have any real links to the country.

He’s clearly not a guy who fell through the cracks, the Scottish and Albanian fa would have been very aware of him - and at this stage, he could represent multiple sides concurrently but he’s only represented ireland. That could change tomorrow - but neither the FAI nor the player have done anything wrong...

Now McGeady for example did play for us over Scotland because we were proactive with him and he was involved with us long before Scotland. As far as I remember, it was Packie Bonner who set it up when McGeady was 13. A few years later, Scotland came calling but he said no. If we had been as proactive with Andy Robertson when he was a young celtic academy player as we were with McGeady, he could be playing for us now...

We should be both developing the best talent here and identifying the best young abroad...

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Originally Posted by kennedmc

Seriously. 'The we've gotten to him first bit' say it all.

I'm not having a go at you Poor Student just why would the FAI bother recruiting 14 year olds from aboard with tenuous links to Ireland?!

I rather they put there time and effort into developing players in Ireland.

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I appreciate it's not directed at me and I'm just piecing together small bits I've seen in articles. I can't speak to his Irishness or lack thereof but if you've ever been to places like Coatbridge there's more than a tenuous connection to Ireland with whole communities in parts of Scotland that trace close lineage here and have a strong cultural connection.

I agree elatedscum -- there's also the argument that if we field the best team possible, that will promote the game and encourage more kids to play -- better results down the line.

Bottom line though, if his mother feels Irish or the kid has a great relationship with his Irish grandparents -- he should have the right to play for us and we should embrace that. Given his parents are born in other countries, I'd suggest he would have held off for either of them if that's where his heart actually is.

I don't know much about Scottish culture but there are plenty reasons why the lad might identify with Ireland as much as Albania or Scotland. Firstly, he's living in Scotland with an Albanian parent so maybe he doesn't feel all that Scottish. I see a 19 year old young lad called Armando Broja who is a very hot prospect with Chelsea already has 6 Albanian senior caps and was born in England. Maybe he didn't identify all that much as English. There's also the fact that he plays for Celtic- the club of his father and maybe his mother too. Old Firm tribalism may have impacted on his identity too. Not to mention Brexit.

Plenty good quotes in this article regarding time spent in Howth and that "His granny is the happiest Irishwoman in Scotland".
https://www.thesun.ie/sport/football...ic-of-ireland/

Anyway, if this is good enough for Wales then why can't it be good enough for us? Plenty of other countries have produced players good enough for the national side of the country in which they were born but the players opted to play for that of their parents. We should be experiencing the benefits of this too. Plenty lads with Wales and Algeria, Achraf Hakimi, Koulibaly, Higuain, Rakitic (plenty others born in Switzerland playing for Balkan countries), Zaha etc. All different circumstances, I'm sure, but we are due a few falling our way now with a long time (the halcyon days of McCarthy and McGeady seem so long ago since Rice and Grealish).

His mother is on twitter fairly regularly and seems to have been pushing it to begin with, and it was pursued by both parties rather than the FAI doing a smash and grab.

I know we're all sore after Rice especially but would hate for the kid to read this thread. Players from the diaspora should be welcomed with open arms.

Ordinarily, we don't start a new thread for a player until they make their senior debut, but Celtic and Rangers' B teams this season are a bit of a grey area - it's senior football, but not with a senior club side, similar to the Premier League 2 sides.
One solution is to rename this thread so it's the 2021/22 U23 thread

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Originally Posted by Kingdom

His mother is on twitter fairly regularly and seems to have been pushing it to begin with, and it was pursued by both parties rather than the FAI doing a smash and grab.

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https://twitter.com/AnnFrancesMurr3

She's great- consistently retweeting the FAI and other Irish player tracker accounts and I see some tweets about how he loves playing for Ireland and Celtic.

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Originally Posted by irishfan86

I know we're all sore after Rice especially but would hate for the kid to read this thread. Players from the diaspora should be welcomed with open arms.

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To be fair, there's as much chance of Rudi pushing him down the Albanian route if he progresses/when the time comes, as there is him sticking with us, surely?

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Originally Posted by Olé Olé

https://twitter.com/AnnFrancesMurr3

She's great- consistently retweeting the FAI and other Irish player tracker accounts and I see some tweets about how he loves playing for Ireland and Celtic.

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Ah yes! She's a babe!

Always welcome to have another prospect coming through at Celtic!

I hope CSAD doesn't read this thread or else the ambulance better be on standby!

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Originally Posted by tetsujin1979

Ordinarily, we don't start a new thread for a player until they make their senior debut, but Celtic and Rangers' B teams this season are a bit of a grey area - it's senior football, but not with a senior club side, similar to the Premier League 2 sides.
One solution is to rename this thread so it's the 2021/22 U23 thread

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Alternative - rename this thread for the Scottish B Teams, to cover updates for Vata and Bosun Lawal at Celtic, and McCann at Rangers

On the bench tonight for Celtic v Hibs. CSAD probably having a conniption as I type this hearing sounds of regression.

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Originally Posted by Poor Student

On the bench tonight for Celtic v Hibs. CSAD probably having a conniption as I type this hearing sounds of regression.

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easy now or you'll be labelled a celtic fan

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Originally Posted by Poor Student

On the bench tonight for Celtic v Hibs. CSAD probably having a conniption as I type this hearing sounds of regression.

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I’ll be banned if I give my opinion on why this has happened tonight, you can thank mod
John for this.

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Originally Posted by CSAD

I’ll be banned if I give my opinion on why this has happened tonight, you can thank mod
John for this.

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why has it happened?

Go on CSAD, go to your well of wisdom one more time, do it for the fans lad ;)

Comes on on 84th minute. Not 18 until next April. A long way to go in his development but nice to see him getting senior minutes, he has clearly outgrown highland pub leagues. Will be interesting to see if he stays with ireland, when Scotland and Albania step up their recruitment game