When England fans watched Dele Alli head Raheem Sterling's cross beyond Robin Olsen to send the Three Lions into the World Cup semi-finals, few of them would have been able to predict the midfielder's subsequent fall from grace.
After a brief but largely unproductive few months at Everton, the former MK Dons starlet is on his way to Besiktas on a season-long loan. Just five years have passed since he won the second of his two PFA Young Player of the Year awards, but a return to Gareth Southgate's England squad looks further away than ever.
It represents a remarkably fast fall from grace for a player who looked at one point as though he could do anything in the game.
At 26 years old, though, there could still be time for him to recover and deliver a second act worthy of the first.
Alli joined Spurs from MK Dons in January 2015, having helped the lower-league side stun Manchester United in the League Cup. A few months back on loan in Milton Keynes suggested he might not have an immediate path to the first team, but that very quickly changed, with manager Mauricio Pochettino feeling like a perfect fit.
“Today, football is about being versatile," Pochettino said in January 2016. "We need to help a player like Dele Alli improve, not put him in a box.
“He needs to feel free on the pitch and we need to help him improve in different positions because a versatile player, like Pogba, has a big, big value.
“He’s a special player. He is box to box but he has real skill on the ball.
“When he plays like a number 10 he makes the movement like a striker and when he plays number eight or number six he plays like a holding midfielder."
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It was under Pochettino that Alli played his best club football, and a lot of this can be put down to the manager understanding how to get the most out of his talents. Spurs' 2015-16 and 2016-17 seasons were built on the midfielder often playing close to Harry Kane, being trusted to deliver as a goalscorer as well as linking things up in the middle.
For a while, Gareth Southgate was able to get the same results at international level. While England's conservative set-up at major tournaments didn't always make for the most incisive football, one thing it did do was allow those in advanced roles to know their responsibilities.
We saw his quality from the get-go at senior level, with big performances in games against France and Germany. However, considering the big part he played in Russia in 2018, it's easy to forget his place didn't look that secure before the tournament.
“There’s no reason he can’t come to Russia and have a huge impact on that tournament," Southgate said after leaving the Spurs man on the bench for the final in-season friendly before the tournament. "We’ve seen the ability he has and with all those guys he is another one who is at an age where he could be playing for the Under-21s.
“The ability and talent is there and I am looking forward to seeing him over the next few weeks,” the manager added. With the pressure fully on, Alli did what was needed not just to travel but to start several games, but that's when the drop-off began.
Alli's career has been strewn with false dawns, and that goal against Sweden is right up there. An emphatic effort in a World Cup quarter-final, bringing joy to millions, is meant to be the start and not the end.
Instead, though, it would end up being his third and final England goal, barring a return to form which has not looked likely since Pochettino left Tottenham in 2019. Of that 23-man squad, even Jamie Vardy looks closer to a recall, and he essentially retired from internationals just a month after the tournament.
Ahead of the 2022 World Cup, England's midfield talents can be grouped into three categories: those nailed on for selection barring injury, those whose early season form will determine their inclusion, and those on Southgate's radar but further from view. That Alli doesn't even make it into the third group speaks to the scale of his drop-off.
While Pochettino looked like the perfect fit for Alli, it didn't take a genius to figure out he'd likely have a tougher time under Jose Mourinho. The Portuguese is far less of an arm-round-the-shoulder manager, and there was a sense that any efforts to endear himself to the former Man Utd boss would come from the wrong kind of blank slate: it wasn't about 'rediscovering' past form, but rather about delivering in the here and now without any reference back to those glory days, and that's something the midfielder couldn't do with any consistency.
“I have no doubts about your potential," Mourinho said to Alli during the Tottenham All or Nothing documentary. "I saw you do incredible things in incredible matches. But I always felt that you had ups and downs.
“There is a huge difference between a player who has consistency and a player who has moments. That is what makes the difference between a top, top player and a player with top potential.
“I am not expecting you to be the man of the match every game. I am not expecting you to score goals every game. I want just to tell you that you will regret it [if you don]t reach your potential]," the manager continued. Two years on, though, it appears that tough love hasn't had the desired effect.
There were brief moments where the quality shone through, be it at Spurs or even for flickers at Everton, but Alli never looked likely to respond to the kind of tough love Mourinho has been prone to offer. The question is whether a different approach or a different manager might have done the trick at Spurs, but that's something we can never know.
Perhaps the Besiktas move is exactly what he needs. A spell out of the Premier League spotlight, and in front of a group of fans who - if scenes from Istanbul are anything to go by - will welcome him with open arms before he has even kicked a ball.
The move evokes memories of Joe Cole's switch to Lille back in 2011. An enigmatic talent who peaked at a young age, benefiting from a fresh start without the baggage and attention that might come from staying in England and being reminded of his past on a near-weekly basis by coming up against those who have usurped him at international level.
On top of it all, Alli is - and this bears repeating - still just 26. He might have more miles in his legs than others of a similar age, having racked up the minutes so young, but there's still time for him to recover what he lost.
Now it's all about whether he can remember what allowed him to unleash his talents and remind us that what we saw in 2018 and before hasn't completely faded from view.
