Ashley Young has recalled a very wise decision that saw him turn down Liverpool and Man City to join Man Utd.
Young joined Manchester United in 2011 from Aston Villa and is now considered a veteran in the current squad. That surely goes without saying with the Englishman aged 34 and being United’s longest serving player alongside Phil Jones, with 257 appearances and five trophies — including a Premier League title — to his name.
He scored six goals and registered 11 assists in his first season under Sir Alex Ferguson as a winger, however, he has since become a full-back and has operated on both flanks in recent seasons.
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Although Young has his critics, the former Villa and Watford star has gone on to wear the captain’s armband at United. He insists MUFC was the only club he ever wanted to join when his time at Villa Park came to an end — not even meeting with Liverpool for talks after hearing Ferguson was interested.
“My agent called me and said: ‘Listen, you’re going into the last year of your contract (at Villa), there are a few teams that are in for you,” Young told the UTD Podcast.
“He said Liverpool. We’d already spoken to City. Then he said United had come in. And I said: ‘When am I [to] meet Sir Alex (Ferguson)? Where’s the pen?’ There was no other place I wanted to go.
“The history of the club, the players that were here, what they’d achieved. For me, that was the place I wanted to be. I wanted to go there and put my marker down on this club and play for the biggest club, for me, in the world. As soon as my agent said that… we didn’t even meet Liverpool.”
Great story.
Young deserves a lot more credit than he usually gets from fans on social media.
His best years are beyond him but Young has been a good servant to the club down the years.
