The Curious Case of Dele Alli | Emotional Overlap interview (p 19)

Alli was born in Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, to a Yoruba Nigerian father Kehinde and English mother Denise. Kehinde moved to the United States a week after Alli's birth. Alli was initially brought up by his mother, who suffered from alcohol problems. At the age of nine, he moved to Nigeria with his father, where he spent two years in an international school before returning to Milton Keynes to live with his mother.

At the age of 13, he moved into the family home of Alan and Sally Hickford, parents of another young footballer with MK Dons and whom he refers to as his "adoptive parents" although he was never legally adopted by them. In the summer of 2016, Alli elected to stop wearing his surname on his match shirts because he felt no connection with the Alli family name, instead opting for "Dele".

On 13 May 2020, Alli was held at knifepoint during a burglary by two men who broke into his house in north London. He was punched and suffered minor facial injuries. The burglars stole jewellery including watches.

His dad f*cked off when he was born, and left him with his alcoholic mother until he was nine, then suddenly shows up in his life and takes him off to another country and culture for two years at the key ages of 9-11.

He made a decent career for himself and things were looking up, but judging by his own comments was clearly carrying that trauma his whole life. He then gets robbed in his home at knife point and cut up on his face, and seemingly straight after his career plummets and managers keep talking about attitude problems…

Anybody going through that would struggle after. When Mou dropped him he wasn’t playing terribly, but it was his attitude according to Mou, who has himself been known for attitude problems and falling out with numerous players.

He left for Everton to get back on track and continued to wobble there, surrounded by other players all wobbling at the club for various reasons. He then went to another country to redeem himself, and for the first half of that loan spell it was working out for him. He was putting in good performances. A new manager came in and it seemed to fall apart for him again.

I’m sure he probably does have attitude problems and various managers aren’t wrong what they’re saying, but I can’t help feel like he’s carrying a lot of things with him, has been delt many bad hands both personally and professionally, and really if someone had came along and helped him with the mental side it might be very different.
 
I have never liked the man, so I admit that I am biased. However, to me he seems to have too aggressive a temperament to last long at anything. He's always looked to me like the sort of bloke you see in a pub and your sixth-sense tells you to steer clear because he has this aura of scarcely suppressed violence about him. The type who can turn at the drop of a hat.

If he does have mental issues, well so do we all in one way or another: some small some large, some debilitating enough to cause us issues that require treatment and/or medication.
Nor is he is alone in experiencing a troubled childhood, so have billions of others.
I can appreciate the man has his problems, and I don't for one second wish to denigrate the suffering he appears to have endured, but he's obviously an immensely wealthy young man, probably never need to work again, has access to the top psycho-analysts from Harley Street or whatever, and I would assume he lives a life of luxury in comparison to the average working-class man.

Regardless of where he goes from here, he is doomed to failure if he cannot control his anger. Violent outbursts nearly always end up creating further violence and I just get the overall impression that he is one volatile young man.

Hope I'm proved wrong.
 
Gary Speed was loaded and it didn’t save him. He was an extreme case though.

I can’t see Dyche finding room for Alli.
 
Nope, ex Spurs and England, bombed out by Watford, now unemployed and training with York City
When between clubs, top flight players will train at any club, any level if offered to do so. You often get out-of-work top division players training with conference teams, but rarely do they then go on to sign at that level, it’s purely for fitness. They soon turn up at another top division side.

His last appearance was in the Premier League for Watford. He left when they went down. If he signs for another club, it might be the Championship at worst, but he’s not headed for the Conference just cause he uses York City’s facilities for a period of time.

He’s also 32.
 

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