Penny is needing to drop for Dele so he has a chance to shine
THE Football Association are doing what they can here to protect their youngest players. Dele Alli and Marcus Rashford have not been put on the roster for media interviews and will only appear in front of the microphones after a game if they happen to perform particularly well.
But however sensible an approach they might consider that to be, protecting them on the field could prove rather more difficult.
Not least for someone like Alli, who is sure to have been identified by England’s opponents both as a serious threat and a player who can be provoked.
Yesterday those closest to the 20-year-old Tottenham midfielder insisted ‘the penny has dropped’.
They say that Alli has worked out for himself that the kind of behaviour that resulted in a threematch ban at the end of the season for Spurs, and very nearly landed him in trouble during last week’s England friendly against Portugal when he shoved Ricardo Carvalho, will not be tolerated here in France.
As Chris Smalling said yesterday, the point has also been made to Roy Hodgson’s players during a refereeing seminar delivered by David Elleray.
But the identity of the referee for Saturday’s opening Group B clash with Russia might yet concern Hodgson, even if Nicola Rizzoli took charge of the last World Cup Final and was regarded that year as the finest in the global game.
Rizzoli has a reputation for being a little too card-happy and has also been accused, at times, of failing to protect players.
Sir Alex Ferguson felt he failed Wayne Rooney during an encounter with Bayern Munich in 2010, while he also missed the horror challenge by PSV’s Hector Moreno that left Luke Shaw nursing a broken leg.
Ultimately it is up to Alli to apply a bit of common sense to his approach and avoid the comparisons that have already been made with Paul Gascoigne, at the time another young Tottenham midfielder, extending to that tearful exit at Italia 90.
Alli is a special talent, and probably the player England supporters should be most excited about seeing on this European Championship stage.
Provided, that is, Hodgson deploys him in a role where he can properly influence a game.
Everything he has achieved in a brief but so far brilliant career says he will take to international tournament football as easily as he did the demands of playing in Tottenham’s first team less than a year ago, the sight of him nutmegging Real Madrid’s Luka Modric on his debut at the Allianz Arena a measure not just of his ability but his confidence.
Modric was so impressed he approached him in the tunnel area after the game to shake his hand.
According to colleagues at Tottenham he dazzled from the moment he arrived at White Hart Lane, impressing Mauricio Pochettino in his very first training session in pre-season and quickly reminding his new manager why he bought him from MK Dons after seeing him excel during the memorable League Cup defeat of Manchester United.
A difficult upbringing in Milton Keynes has been given as the principal reason for the short fuse, the mere fact that he spent much of his youth being raised by Alan and Sally Hickford, the parents of a then team-mate, an illustration of the challenges young Alli had to overcome. He remains close to both his old club and his home town, even returning last season to watch MK Dons reserve team matches, while the Hickfords will always be family.
Eric Dier is also now a member of that family. Alli affectionately refers to him as a ‘big brother’ and they are said to be as inseparable here in Chantilly as they are at Tottenham.
Fiercely loyal as well as fiercely protective, it was a desire to defend Dier that saw Alli become embroiled in a bit of controversy during a game against Liverpool earlier this season. ‘I think he felt Eric was being bullied,’ said one insider yesterday. ‘And Dele stands up to bullies.’
You can see that in the way he sometimes responds to provocation on the pitch, and what he clearly regards as attempts to intimidate a young player new to both the Premier League and international football.
Alli is blessed with great natural skill and his supporters insist he has a sharp brain too; bright enough, certainly, to figure out that transgressions similar to those he has committed in the past will be severely punished at Euro 2016.
Smalling insisted the players had received the necessary warnings, revealing how Elleray had explained to England’s players that the officials at this tournament will be less tolerant than those they encounter in club football. ‘In the Premier League you maybe do one or two fouls before a booking comes,’ said the England defender. ‘But here they may clamp down sooner.’
That being the case, England need Alli to demonstrate that he can not only listen but learn, and have the kind of impact that has more players of the stature of Modric shaking his hand in admiration.