Smiling Dele Alli has the 'devil on his shoulder' again in Como's wonderland - now he just needs to stay on the pitch to chase down his World Cup dream

Dele has always played on the edge. As continually attested to by former manager Mauricio Pochettino, he needs a "devil on his shoulder".

"It's who he is. Dele Alli is Dele Alli because of how he is. Dele Alli is Dele Alli because he's a little bit naughty. It's his character, in a good way," the Argentine said midway through the 2016-17 season in which the midfielder registered 22 goals and 10 assists for Tottenham. "He's a brilliant boy. He has a brilliant brain, he's very smart. He is very sensitive, very intuitive because he comes from a difficult background. You can understand when you're with him, but he's a very nice person - off the pitch!"

Roughly 18 months later, Pochettino claimed Dele needed to feel a sense of occasion to raise his game accordingly: "Training sessions sometimes, if you do finishing without opposition, we say, 'Come on Dele, you have the capacity to score'. But if you put opposition, he scores unbelievable goals... He needs to feel the competition. I think you can improve but you need to be born with this character and this mental strength. Then you need people to help you improve. If you don't have from your parents it’s so difficult, you can improve a little bit but it's not a thing you can buy in the market."

Granted, these anecdotes came nearly a decade ago now. Dele could get away with the punches and the middle fingers and the high challenges when he was a relative adolescent in an unforgiving footballing world, but as he approaches his thirties, he needs to find a way to channel that aggressive hunger into helping his team and hush that 'devil on his shoulder' when appropriate.

What made Dele's red card at Milan so much worse was it killed off Como's chances of a comeback at 2-1 down. They had done well to claw their way back into the contest and improve their chances of taking another scalp on their first venture in the Italian top flight, only for the Rossoneri's one-man advantage late in the day to prove too significant a hurdle to overcome. Had Como been in a comfortable position during the game and cruising on autopilot, then Dele's dismissal may have proven a footnote, but it went down as the ultimate turning point.

Head coach Cesc Fabregas said post-match: "Milan have world-class players, they are a good team. [Dele] is a player who scores goals, at this moment he has to improve a lot and it is a serious mistake for someone of his experience. He left the team in difficulty, that is the negative thing of the evening."

That's quite a brutal assessment to take from a manager, particularly as the challenge went without divine punishment at first glance and, as Dele protested, only looked worse on replay when slowed down. But that's fine; that might be the fuel he needs to fire up again.

Having been so honest and open over his struggles off the pitch, it would have been understandable for Dele's mood to sour leaving San Siro. Instead, he got up, dusted himself off and delved into making some self-deprecating fun of himself.

In an Instagram post after the Milan debacle, Dele revealed a WhatsApp exchange with Loftus-Cheek in which they both admitted to being confused by the VAR check at first, while the ex-Chelsea midfielder said he remained on the ground after the challenge because was out of breath rather than in pain from the foul.

Dele has gotten away with far worse than what he left on Loftus-Cheek, but he still could have succumbed to or absorbed a barrage of abuse had he tackled the aftermath in similarly careless rather than malicious fashion. The player and person of years gone by might have let the devil on his shoulder take over in a blazing rage. It's the sort of emotional maturity Fabregas would have been seeking in the aftermath.

There was also recognition from Como's highest authority, club president Mirwan Suwarso, that Dele's short-lived comeback was a sign of promise and not damnation. Taking to Instagram himself, Suwarso said: "The fire still burns. After nearly two years, Dele Alli stepped back onto the battlefield. It takes courage to keep going, to fight through doubt, to silence the noise, and to return, not just to play, but to compete at the highest level once again.

"Some will talk about the red card. Let them. We saw something else. We saw hunger. We saw resilience. We saw flashes of brilliance. And those of us who watch him train every day know. This is only the beginning. The road back is never easy, but warriors don't quit. Keep going, Dele. Your best is yet to come. Semm Cumasch."

Cynics could construe this as higher-ups taking over (and they have), but there isn't a gun against Fabregas' head telling him to play Dele for the sake of it. After all, the Spaniard was reluctant to discuss him when the midfielder first touched down in the city. Como's image has benefitted from some marquee arrivals but it's far from a vanity project, and a budding young coach with such an idealistic vision wouldn't risk compromising his philosophy for the sake of shoehorning in a player they didn't believe in. Dele is there to play football.

There is a perfect and fitting balance to Dele restarting his career in Como as a city and club. The picturesque Lombardy backdrop overlooking one of the world's most breathtaking lakes was hot enough as an A-list tourist attraction already, but the likes of Hollywood stars Keira Knightley, Michael Fassbender and Adrien Brody have all been pictured in the Stadio Giuseppe Sinigaglia stands in recent times.

It's football's newest hotspot, even though the stadium remains subpar in pretty much every category besides the external views. Dele, not afraid of heading abroad in an attempt to reignite that internal flame, has dived into his new surroundings and has seemingly rediscovered his smile, settling in alongside girlfriend Cindy Kimberly. He was and is a big name who has survived in the harshest conditions and most intense spotlights, it's only right in some way that this be the stage for his return.

You can even strip back the setting and find that Como is an ideal place for Dele to be from a purely sporting perspective too. Italian journalist Daniele Fisichella has quipped: "[Como is] probably looks like the perfect environment for him to get back to his best. Cesc Fabregas has been lauded these days for the way he's got his team playing and for also the preparation and the managerial skills that he has demonstrated in his year-and-a-half he's been in Italy.

"So there is no doubt about it, as an environment, it's probably one of the best for Dele Alli. Como is a team that likes to play football, to play on the front foot. So obviously having a player like Dele Alli, if he can get back to his best, will definitely be a blessing for him. I would expect if he continues to train and he shows good improvements, there will probably be a few cameos towards the end of the season. As said, Como are not in danger of going down. It could be the perfect platform for him to show what he's capable of doing."

Dele's bare-all interview with Gary Neville in 2023 was one of the most shocking and heart-breaking in modern football. The anguish and agony he revealed from adolescence to adulthood showed how irrelevant football can be in comparison to the rest of life - mentor Pochettino admitted he couldn't even watch the whole sit-down such was his own emotional reaction.

It allowed the public to see that while Dele perhaps had unfulfilled potential as a world-class player, he won at life by escaping the various hells elsewhere in his existence. By opening up on a public platform, he was selfless in not only looking to lift that burden off his own shoulders, but potentially others.

Brentford captain Christian Norgaard last month said Dele's admission to a sleeping pill addiction stopped him falling down a similar hole: "It was tough to watch, but it was also touching and it was quite emotional for someone like me who struggled with it and could've maybe ended up being addicted to these sleeping tablets. I remember sending a text to our sleeping coach Anna to say thank you for the things we've been working on because this is a clear picture of how bad it can go. It's a topic that has maybe been going a bit under the radar. I think now it's getting emphasised, not only in football but in general, how important it is."

Whether this was his intention or not, Dele has become an ambassador for battling the taboo and a face of redemption away from the pitch, an inspiration for more than what he does with the ball at his feet.

"I have a reminder at 11 o'clock every day that says, 'World Cup 2026'. That's my aim for now," Dele told Neville in 2023. Whether that's still an alarm set to this day is unknown to the public, but it'd be for the greater good if it did remain.

There have been stranger stories in football; it throws about these sorts of zero-to-hero tales all the time. It's incredibly unlikely that Dele will make England's final 26-player cut, though not impossible. Thomas Tuchel has already laid bare his plans to lean on experience and know-how. Hell, if Jordan Henderson can earn a recall, why can't Dele?!

In his prime, Dele thrived between the lines and was a tactical headache for any team to stop. In the second half of his career so far, he's turned into more of a box-to-box midfielder, more akin to his role in Gareth Southgate's setup at the 2018 World Cup. The ingredients are there for Dele to conjure up a sensational comeback on the international stage, though this is a far more competitive England squad to break back into than the one he left behind.

If Dele can stay fit and healthy, if he can keep that inner fire burning, then he has a shot of another World Cup adventure. That should be the aim, even if it doesn't come to pass. Whatever happens, it's fantastic to be talking about him in this vein again, isn't it?