Dele Alli is back on the market at 30 after Como terminated his contract in September, leaving the former Tottenham midfielder without a club and looking for a route back into the game.
That would have sounded unthinkable not long ago. Alli was once a guaranteed starter for the Three Lions and the crown jewel of Tottenham’s midfield after his £5 million move from MK Dons in 2015, when he looked like one of the most exciting young attackers in England.
His name still carries the weight of that earlier rise, but the latest chapter is a stark one. Como, run by Cesc Fabregas, released him and he is now a high-profile free agent, a status that underlines how far his career has fallen from the heights of north London and the England team.
The clearest reminder of what Alli once was comes from people who saw him before the stadium lights and transfer fees. Former MK Dons defender Jordan Buck described a teenager who could surge through the pitch with rare ease, comparing his driving runs to Mousa Dembele and Yaya Toure. Buck said Alli would drop deep, take the ball directly from the keeper, glide through midfield and then pick out a pass in the final third.
“He was so skinny, but he just used to just glide past people. This was just a tall frame, just knows when to touch the ball, when to shift his body. And he just cut through players. Like the way Mousa Dembele and Yaya Toure used to drive past players, not like an Eden Hazard or a Mohamed Salah. He’d drop so deep, get the ball directly from the keeper and just glide through from his box, through the midfield, and then he’s finding a pass in the final third,” Buck said.
He added that the first time he saw Alli in that environment, he had no idea what he was about to watch. “I had no idea who he was. That day, I had no idea,” Buck said. Later, he said the midfielder was “just a tall, skinny dude just picking up the ball and just driving through everyone,” adding that he was “unreal” and “shining through” as he carried the ball the length of the pitch.
That version of Alli made the step up look inevitable. The difficult spell at Everton and the loan in Turkey with Besiktas told a different story, one in which the burst, authority and consistency that once defined him were much harder to find. His release by Como last month only sharpened the contrast between the player he was and the player he has become.
For now, the question is not whether Alli once belonged among England’s brightest talents. It is whether any club believes there is still enough left in the 30-year-old to justify one more chance.
