Luis Binks: From Montreal Ghost Town to Scotland's New Hope

Luis Binks sits in the shade of the palm trees at La Manga, Scotland’s temporary base this week, and laughs at the absurdity of it all. Every footballer has a story. His feels like something out of a dream – or a lockdown hallucination.

He is 25 now, captain of Brondby, and on the brink of a first Scotland cap against Slovenia on Saturday. A vacancy has opened up at the heart of Sebastien Pocognoli’s defence since Grant Hanley and John Souttar were moved on after the Belgian replaced Steve Clarke. Binks, eligible through a grandparent from Dunbar, is one of eight uncapped players in this reshaped squad.

New Manager, New Faces

New manager. New faces. New backstories. His might be the wildest of the lot.

It starts in Montreal, four years ago. February into March 2020. Binks was 18, walking away from the comfort of Tottenham’s academy and into the unknown of MLS with Montreal Impact.

“I'd been at Tottenham since I was very young, but I just wanted to go and play first-team football,” he recalls. That was the obsession. Get out. Play for real points, in real stadiums, against grown men. “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.”

The test came with a twist. His manager was Thierry Henry.

He signed in February. By March, the world had shut down.

“I'd signed in February and then we went into Covid lockdown in March,” Binks 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.”

Montreal closed in around them. The club wanted to move him to a hotel by the airport. Isolation on the edge of the city. “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.”

Then the phone rang.

Henry was staying at the Ritz-Carlton. Alone.

“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 is a five-star bolt-hole with 129 rooms. During that strange, silent spell, two people lived there: Thierry Henry and Luis Binks.

“I'd go for runs in the morning and he'd be sat in the reception on his own,” Binks remembers. “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.”

The images are almost comic. A teenage centre-half, fresh out of Tottenham’s academy, padding back through the marble lobby in his running gear. One of the greatest forwards of his generation, sitting alone in reception, waiting, thinking, talking.

Then there was the night of the pizza.

“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?’,” Binks says. So off they went. “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 like it’s just two team-mates hanging out. But he knows better.

“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.”

The memories blur a little under the weight of everything that’s happened since, but some details stay sharp. The way Henry spoke about Sol Campbell. The standards he described. The specifics of what separates a good defender from a great one.

“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.”

Those conversations in an empty five-star hotel shaped him. They gave him a reference point, a level to chase. They also gave him his start.

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

From ghost-town Montreal to the palm trees of La Manga, Binks now stands on the edge of another first. This time, it is a Scotland shirt he is chasing, in a back line being rebuilt by a new manager with new ideas.

The surroundings have changed. The stakes have risen. But the theme is the same: step out of the comfort zone, and see how far the game will take you.