Aston Villa’s Jack Grealish is writing a new reputation for himself in the Championship

During the Championship play-off final back in May, the midfielder received the ball just past the halfway line with only Robert Snodgrass - an ocean away, hugging the right touchline - and a seemingly rogue Alan Hutton in front of him.

Grealish collected it in his stride and surged past Fulham's Stefan Johansen - a player who had been attempting to put two hands around the neck of his shadow all game - and straight towards Tim Ream. Ream met him about as apprehensively as one would a rhinoceros who had just been issued a parking ticket, and Grealish chopped past him with ease. It was effortless, almost disdainful, the work of a disgruntled Michelin chef taking out his aggression on the carrots with his knife. Johansen had caught up by this point, only to join Ream in resembling a drowning man, limbs flailing, gasping for air, as Grealish turned him one way and then the other. Kevin McDonald, Denis Odoi, and the goalkeeper were the only obstacles left to navigate. He did so with a deliberate feint, an instant switch from one foot to the next, leaving both McDonald and Odoi trailing in his jet stream, the scent of pomade stinging their nostrils. Had Grealish ended his slalom across the Wembley pitch by finishing hard and low through the legs of Marcus Bettinelli on his left foot - rather than seeing the goalkeeper just about read the trajectory to deflect it away - it would have gone down as one of the great solo goals in Wembley history. But, like so much of Grealish’s career to date, it didn’t quite happen for him, or for Aston Villa that day. Once again he remains on the very cusp of what might be. The main problem for the 22-year-old is the same as it's always been. He is still an easy target for the casual fan, along with hardened opposition defenders. Whether it's the aerodynamic hair, slicked back like a road cyclist's helmet, or the lowered socks and vague hint of shin protection, his idiosyncratic style seems to rub people up the wrong way. It's that certain air he has about him, the raised chin and pointed features giving the impression of the cocky lad at school who got the girl you liked (and also happened to be really good at football). Maybe that's what makes rival fans hate him that bit more. Then there's the way his mouth contorts into a panto villain scowl after a tackle, cheekbones sharpened and brow furrowed in indignation. He doesn't just get fouled in the typical way fouls occur during the natural flow of a game. It is always targeted and cynical; as though Grealish must suffer through a 'Kick Me' sign he has supposedly placed on his own back. There's always a touch of malice, as though there is some personal vendetta bubbling under the surface, due to an old betrayal from a school disco a decade ago. In the early days of his time in the Villa first team, after coming on against Hull City in 2014, three Tigers players received yellow cards within the space of five minutes. All of them were for clumsy hacks on Grealish, who had only been on the pitch for 12 minutes himself. His current manager Steve Bruce was in the visiting dugout that day, and now must he watch as other managers try the same hamfisted methods to slow down the man pulling the strings in the middle. Bruce has been something of a father figure to his young charge. After splitting his kidney in two places in August 2017, the result of a clumsy challenge by former teammate Tom Cleverley, Grealish was ruled out for the first four months of the Championship campaign. With Bruce now in his corner, it would prove to be the making rather than the breaking of the young playmaker. A new fitness regime with trainer and former youth teammate Oli Stevenson, which included intensive upper-body work in the gym, transformed his stature while he was out of the team. When he came back it felt as though his mercurial Chris Waddle-streak had been amplified, but now bolstered with an unshakeable grit resembling Spurs' Mousa Dembele. In this window or the next, Dembele might be the man Grealish replaces at the new Tottenham Stadium. Like Dembele, Grealish has evolved into a masterful tightrope dribbler, weaving his way through the swinging blades of the overenthusiastic midfields in the second tier. He hardly ever stumbles or teeters, preferring instead to absorb the contact as though he were wearing Black Panther's kinetic energy suit. You can almost picture him invading Lunch atop a Skyscraper, that famous photograph of the Empire State Building steelworkers perched precariously on a girder, tiptoeing across the edges of the beam with the ball at his feet. He is also a yard or two quicker, very obviously physically fitter, and plays much deeper where he can have more influence on the game. Often he can be seen picking the ball up directly from the defence around his own box, the Steve Bruce masterplan of 'give the ball to Jack' drilled into players as senior as John Terry, Mile Jedinak and James Chester last season. If they were all Villa's vocal leaders, Grealish was the emotional one, the kid brother coming of age. He always wants the ball, be it in the tightest corners, no matter the score, no matter the opponent, no matter the number of kicks he has already taken. He's forever on show because of the hair, the socks and previous bad-boy reputation, but he's also there because he never hides. Had he finished that chance at Wembley, hard and low through the legs of Bettinelli on his left foot, then perhaps it would have all been different. Perhaps the story of him carrying the historic club he has supported since he was a boy back to the Premier League would be enough to override the one of him lying on his back somewhere in Tenerife, splashed across the back pages. As it stands, for many he's still the sulky Peaky Blinders show pony too lightweight for the top flight. That has already been decided for him, even as he continues to move across the rope, unwavering, one step closer to everything he might be and one step further away from everything they ever thought he was.