I won elite Uefa tournament and made history with Scotland but retired at 23

NOT many players can say they’ve won an elite Uefa competition and made history on the international stage by the age of 19.

But for anyone who does achieve both feats, you’d expect them to have the world at their feet years later.

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That hasn’t been the case for Ruben Sammut – on the pitch at least.

Scots might remember the midfielder from when he was considered one of the brightest talents coming through the Hampden youth ranks.

Capped at all age groups bar senior level, Sammut was widely considered one for the future for the Tartan Army while making his way through the Chelsea academy.

He was even part of the only Scotland team to ever beat Brazil at any level in 2017.

Sammut burst onto the scene as a teenager and regularly played above his age group, making his U18 debut in 2013 aged just 15.

And he enjoyed his first real taste of senior football in the SPFL on loan at Falkirk during the 2017/18 season.

But that short stint in Scotland was his only real experience of playing against fellow senior pros.

That’s because he left Chelsea in the summer of 2018 without making a single appearance and struggled at his next club Sunderland before dropping down to the National League for the 2020/21 campaign.

It was a quite a fall from grace for the promising midfielder who previously won the Uefa Youth League and Youth FA Cup on two occasions each with the Stamford Bridge side.

He watched former team-mates such as Dominic Solanke, Mason Mount and Tammy Abraham go onto have incredible careers in the Premier League and in Europe.

He even played alongside current Rangers star Dujon Sterling and former Celtic ace Charly Musonda in London.

But much like Musonda, Sammut could never hit the heights other did.

And he decided to call it a day on the pitch aged just 23 after struggling to find a club due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

However, although he is no longer playing alongside the world’s best, he is now scouting them instead.

Sammut, 27, is back at his old club Chelsea and has been working as a senior scout since May 2023.

The former midfielder now scouts specifically for the first team after spending a few months as an academy scout whilst he was playing for Dulwich Hamlet.

According to his Linkedin page, Sammut swapped Chelsea for a more senior role at Charlton in 2021, having been named as a first team recruitment coordinator.

During that stint he oversaw a team of scouts across England and ensured they created a database which provided players who suited the team’s system.

The 27-year-old first started using AI as a tool at Charlton and continues to use it to identify players at Stamford Bridge.

Not only is he a senior scout at Chelsea but he also assists the development of their AI scouting platform for the academy.

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