Scott Fraser McKenna (born 12 November 1996) is a Scottish professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...

who plays as a

centre-back In the sport of association football, a defender is an outfield player whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Defenders fall into four main categories: centre-backs, full-backs, sweepers ...

for the HNL club

Dinamo Zagreb Građanski nogometni klub Dinamo Zagreb (), commonly referred to as simply Dinamo Zagreb (), is a Croatian professional football club based in Zagreb. Dinamo play their home matches at Stadion Maksimir. They are the most successful club in Cr ...

and the Scotland national team.

Club career

Aberdeen

McKenna began his career in the

Aberdeen Aberdeen ( ; ; ) is a port city in North East Scotland, and is the List of towns and cities in Scotland by population, third most populous Cities of Scotland, Scottish city. Historically, Aberdeen was within the historic county of Aberdeensh ...

academy and was initially a

left back In the sport of association football, a defender is an Glossary of association football terms#O, outfield player whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Defenders fall into four main categ ...

before moving to the centre. The ''Daily Record'' called him "one of the most promising defenders in the country". McKenna made his professional debut for Aberdeen as a substitute against

St Johnstone St Johnstone Football Club is a professional association football club in Perth, Scotland. The team competes in the , the second division of Scottish football. The club's name is derived from St John's Toun (or Saint Johnstoun)—an old name o ...

on 6 February 2016. His first start came against Heart of Midlothian on 16 May 2016. On 22 May 2016, he signed a new two-year contract with Aberdeen, In November 2016, McKenna moved on loan to

Scottish Championship The Scottish Championship known as the William Hill (bookmaker), William Hill Championship for sponsorship reasons, is the second tier of the Scottish Professional Football League, the league competition for men's professional association footb ...

side

Ayr United Ayr United Football Club are a football club in Ayr, Scotland, who play in the , the second tier of the Scottish Professional Football League. Formed in 1910 by the merger of Ayr Parkhouse and Ayr F.C., their nickname is The Honest Men, fro ...

for 28 days, his second time on loan with the club. His loan was subsequently extended until the end of the season. In October 2017, McKenna extended his Aberdeen contract until 2021. The club rejected a bid from

Hull City Hull City Association Football Club is a professional association football club based in Kingston upon Hull, East Riding of Yorkshire, England. They compete in the , the second level of the English football league system. They play their home ...

to buy him in January 2018. In January 2018, McKenna scored from more than 35 yards in Aberdeen's 3–1 win against

Kilmarnock Kilmarnock ( ; ; , ), meaning "the church of Mernóc", is a town and former burgh in East Ayrshire situated in southwest Scotland. The town has served as the administrative centre of East Ayrshire Council since 1996 and is the region's main ...

. He claimed in an interview after the match that Kilmarnock skipper

Kris Boyd Kris Boyd (born 18 August 1983) is a Scottish former professional footballer who played as a forward, currently working as a sports pundit. As a player he was a forward. Boyd grew up in the South Ayrshire village of Tarbolton and started h ...

urged him to "shoot" so he obliged. On 7 March 2018, McKenna signed a new contract extension until 2023. Aberdeen rejected an offer of £3.5 million for McKenna from

Celtic Celtic, Celtics or Keltic may refer to: Language and ethnicity *pertaining to Celts, a collection of Indo-European peoples in Europe and Anatolia **Celts (modern) *Celtic languages **Proto-Celtic language *Celtic music *Celtic nations Sports Foot ...

in August 2018. Later in August, Aberdeen rejected a larger offer from

Aston Villa Aston Villa Football Club (commonly referred to as simply Villa) is a professional football club based in Aston, Birmingham, England. The club, founded in 1874, compete in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. The team have p ...

. During the summer 2019 transfer window, Aberdeen rejected offers from

Queens Park Rangers Queens Park Rangers Football Club, commonly abbreviated to QPR, is a professional association football club based in Shepherd's Bush, West London, England. The team currently compete in the EFL Championship, the second level of the English f ...

and

Nottingham Forest Nottingham Forest Football Club is a professional association football club based in West Bridgford, Nottinghamshire, England. The club competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football league system, English football. Founde ...

for McKenna after he handed in a transfer request. In December 2019 Aberdeen chairman Dave Cormack confirmed the club had received no offers or approaches from other clubs for McKenna or teammate

Sam Cosgrove Sam Benjamin Cosgrove (born 2 December 1996) is an English professional footballer who plays as a striker for club Barnsley. He began his career with Wigan Athletic, and had loan spells in non-league football with Barrow, Chorley, Nantwich T ...

. McKenna suffered a torn hamstring during a Scottish Cup tie at St Mirren on 29 February 2020. In August 2020 he was one of eight Aberdeen players who received a suspended three-match ban from the

Scottish FA The Scottish Football Association (; also known as the Scottish FA and the SFA) is the governing body of football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to s ...

after they breached restrictions relating to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

by visiting a bar earlier in the month. Aberdeen entered transfer negotiations with Nottingham Forest regarding McKenna in September 2020, which meant that he was left out of the Aberdeen team for a match with

Motherwell Motherwell (, ) is a List of towns and cities in Scotland by population, town and former burgh in North Lanarkshire, Scotland, United Kingdom, south east of Glasgow. It has a population of around 32,120. Shires of Scotland, Historically in the p ...

Nottingham Forest

On 23 September 2020, McKenna moved to

EFL Championship The English Football League Championship, known simply as the Championship and for sponsorship purposes as Sky Bet Championship, is a professional association football league in England and Wales. Contested by 24 clubs, it is the highest divi ...

side

for an undisclosed fee, confirmed by Aberdeen as a "club-record" amount reported to be £3 million that could rise to £6 million. He made his Forest debut on 25 September 2020 in a 1–0 defeat to

Huddersfield Town Huddersfield Town Association Football Club is a professional association football club based in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, England. They compete in , the third tier of English football league system, English football. Huddersfield Town we ...

. He scored his first goal for the club in a 2–1 win over

Coventry City Coventry City Football Club is an English professional football club based in Coventry, West Midlands. The club plays in the EFL Championship, the second tier of English football. The club is nicknamed The Sky Blues after the sky blue colou ...

on 4 November 2020. He was voted as Forest's Player of the Season for the 2021–22 campaign, during which they won promotion to the

Premier League The Premier League is a professional association football league in England and the highest level of the English football league system. Contested by 20 clubs, it operates on a system of promotion and relegation with the English Football Lea ...

. McKenna missed significant parts of the

2022–23 The dash is a punctuation mark consisting of a long horizontal line. It is similar in appearance to the hyphen but is longer and sometimes higher from the baseline. The most common versions are the endash , generally longer than the hyphen ...

season due to hamstring and collarbone injuries. On 30 January 2024, McKenna joined

Danish Superliga The Danish Superliga (, ) is a professional association football league in Denmark and the highest level of the Danish football league system. The league is currently contested by 12 teams each year, with 2 teams relegated. It is the current ...

club

Copenhagen Copenhagen ( ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a population of 1.4 million in the Urban area of Copenhagen, urban area. The city is situated on the islands of Zealand and Amager, separated from Malmö, Sweden, by the ...

on loan for the remainder of the season. On 5 June 2024, Forest announced he would be leaving in the summer when his contract expired.

Las Palmas

On 8 August 2024, McKenna joined

Las Palmas Las Palmas (, ; ), officially Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, is a Spanish city and capital of Gran Canaria, in the Canary Islands, in the Atlantic Ocean. It is the capital city of the Canary Islands (jointly with Santa Cruz de Tenerife) and the m ...

on a three-year contract.

International career

McKenna captained the Scotland under-19s in a 2–2 draw with the

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, also known as Czechia, and historically known as Bohemia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the south ...

in 2014. McKenna made his first appearance for the Scotland under-21s in September 2017. McKenna was selected for the full national squad in March 2018, and made his full international debut in a 1–0 defeat against

Costa Rica Costa Rica, officially the Republic of Costa Rica, is a country in Central America. It borders Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the northeast, Panama to the southeast, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, as well as Maritime bo ...

on 23 March. In his fourth game for Scotland, a 1–0 defeat to

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

on 2 June 2018, McKenna was made team

captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader or highest rank officer of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police depa ...

. On 11 October 2018, McKenna came on a second-half substitute in a 2–1 defeat against

Israel Israel, officially the State of Israel, is a country in West Asia. It Borders of Israel, shares borders with Lebanon to the north, Syria to the north-east, Jordan to the east, Egypt to the south-west, and the Mediterranean Sea to the west. Isr ...

, marking his competitive debut for Scotland. On 7 June 2024, McKenna was named in Scotland's squad for the

UEFA Euro 2024 The 2024 UEFA European Football Championship, commonly referred to as UEFA Euro 2024 (stylised as UEFA EURO 2024) or simply Euro 2024, was the 17th UEFA European Championship, the quadrennial international Association football, football champ ...

finals in Germany. He appeared in all three of the team's matches at the tournament, coming on as a substitute against both

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

and

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

, before starting against

Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia and ...

as Scotland finished bottom of

Group A Group A is a set of motorsport regulations administered by the FIA covering production derived touring cars for competition, usually in touring car racing and rallying. In contrast to the short-lived Group B and Group C, Group A vehicles wer ...

with one point from three matches.

Personal life

A pupil at Webster's High School in

Kirriemuir Kirriemuir ( , ; ), sometimes called Kirrie or the ''Wee Red Toon'', is a burgh in Angus, Scotland, United Kingdom. The playwright J. M. Barrie was born and buried here and a statue of Peter Pan is in the town square. History Some of th ...

, McKenna supported Celtic as a boy. He is distantly related to the late

Alan Gilzean Alan John Gilzean (; 22 October 1938 – 8 July 2018) was a Scottish professional footballer, active from 1955 to 1975. A striker, Gilzean played most prominently for Dundee and Tottenham Hotspur, and also appeared in 22 international games fo ...

, who was a cousin of McKenna's maternal grandmother. His father Ian played semi-professionally in the

Scottish Football League The Scottish Football League (SFL) is a defunct league featuring professional and semi-professional football clubs mostly from Scotland.One club, Berwick Rangers, is based in the town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, which is located approximately 4&nbs ...

for

Forfar Athletic Forfar Athletic Football Club are a Scottish semi-professional football club from the town of Forfar, Angus. They are members of the Scottish Professional Football League and currently play in . They play their home games at Station Park, in t ...

and Montrose in the 1990s.

Career statistics

Club

International

''Scores and results list Scotland's goal tally first.''

Honours

Nottingham Forest *

EFL Championship play-offs The English Football League (EFL) Championship play-offs are a series of play-off matches contested by the association football teams finishing from third to sixth in the EFL Championship table and are part of the English Football League play-o ...

2022 The year began with another wave in the COVID-19 pandemic, with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant, Omicron spreading rapidly and becoming the dominant variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus worldwide. Tracking a decrease in cases and deaths, 2022 saw ...

Individual *

Player of the Season 2021–22

References

External links

Profile
at the Nottingham Forest F.C. website {{DEFAULTSORT:McKenna, Scott 1996 births Living people People from Kirriemuir Footballers from Angus, Scotland Scottish men's footballers Aberdeen F.C. players Ayr United F.C. players Alloa Athletic F.C. players Nottingham Forest F.C. players F.C. Copenhagen players UD Las Palmas players GNK Dinamo Zagreb players Men's association football central defenders Scottish Professional Football League players English Football League players Premier League players La Liga players Scotland men's youth international footballers Scotland men's under-21 international footballers Scotland men's international footballers UEFA Euro 2020 players Scottish expatriate men's footballers Expatriate men's footballers in Denmark Scottish expatriate sportspeople in Denmark Expatriate men's footballers in Spain Scottish expatriate sportspeople in Spain Expatriate men's footballers in Croatia UEFA Euro 2024 players 21st-century Scottish sportsmen