When a young player fails at a top club, there is often an assumption that they’re not mentally equipped to be a success at that level. But no two footballers are precisely the same and no journey of development takes exactly the same course. Sometimes players need to go down the pecking order to bounce back up again, and sometimes that failure is the motivation they need to drive them to reach their fullest potential.

Sometimes too, they simply make the move too soon or at the wrong time; that may well have been the case with Wilfried Zaha who, after firing Crystal Palace to the Premier League in 2012/13, made just four senior appearances for Manchester United as a 21-year-old before returning to his boyhood club.

In any case, there’s no better way to prove you belong at the top level than consistently performing against that bracket of football club, which is exactly what the Ivory Coast winger did last season.

His twelve performances against last season’s top six were instrumental in keeping Palace in the Premier League after a disastrous run under Alan Pardew, producing a return of one goal and five assists – that’s more than half of his setups for the entire campaign coming against the very best the English top flight has to offer.

More than just output, though, which was the biggest criticism of Zaha during the early stages of his career, the winger-forward’s all-round performances against top quality opposition have shown an aggression, intelligence and work-ethic you wouldn’t necessarily expect of a young wide-man who has already failed to take one chance at the top and tasted the often-debasing fame and fortune that comes with a club of Manchester United’s stature. Just look at Adnan Januzaj, once English football’s most coveted teenager who is now trying to rebuild his career at Real Sociedad.

In stark contrast to the young Belgian who always had a knack of reverting back into his own shell, Zaha showed incredible responsibility both with and without the ball against the Premier League’s top sides in 2016/17.

While we’ve come to expect dazzling dribbling displays on the counter-attack, Zaha also demonstrated the intelligence to bring his team up the pitch by winning fouls in dangerous areas and the tenacity to play a key role in Palace’s many rear-guard displays by averaging 2.3 tackles per match. In fact, against all opposition, Burnley’s George Boyd was the only winger to complete more tackles than Zaha in the Premier League last season.

While that’s partly a consequence of Palace’s counter-attacking style of play, and something that’s required far more of wingers outside the top six, the combination with Zaha’s deadly dribbling and impressive output makes him a unique proposition amid a Premier League era in which high pressing and energy from the front is more prevalent than ever before.

Liverpool, Manchester City and Tottenham all pride themselves on the aggression of their attacking personnel but according to the statistics, Zaha made more tackles than all of them last season.

This term, Zaha’s season has taken something of a different course. While he’s continued to impress, his best performances have come against those closest to Palace in the table; goals against Everton and West Ham who have been involved in the relegation scrap as well, alongside productive displays in the 2-1 win over Stoke City and the 2-2 draw with Bournemouth.

Although that’s far more conventional and expected, it should be acknowledged in similarly impressive terms nonetheless – when boiled down, Zaha is quite simply producing upon facing the teams Palace need results against to turn their abysmal start around.

But having been linked with Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester City ahead of the January transfer window, this coming week represents a pivotal audition in Zaha’s career as Palace prepare to face the Gunners and the Citizens before the turn of 2018.

Not only will the 25-year-old have the chance to flaunt his abilities against two potential future managers, should tabloid gossip be believed, but also the chance to show those managers last season’s returns against the top clubs wasn’t simply a fluke or statistical quirk. And while an attacking player who can consistently perform against the big clubs or the small clubs is one thing, one who can perform against both is something else altogether. In fact, it makes Zaha pretty much the total package.

The big question, however, is the viability of a mid-season move. He’s valued at just £16.2million by Transfermarkt but Crystal Palace will expect far more if they’re to part with their most valuable attacking outlet amid a relegation fight. At the same time, while an Alexis departure may force Arsenal to move for the eight-cap international, City’s ginormous margin at the top of the table could convince them and Chelsea that any reinforcements can wait until the summer, when they’ll have another half-season of evidence to determine Zaha’s suitability and when the deals usually feel less extortionate.

In any case, though, this week feels like perhaps the biggest yet in Zaha’s career. Consecutive impressive performances against the calibre of club once deemed beyond him won’t go unnoticed, and it might well be what convinces Pep Guardiola, Arsene Wenger or Antonio Conte to put some money on the table – be it in January or the summer.