Ashley Young has revealed he could have reunited with Sean Dyche much earlier than the summer.
Speaking to Sky Sports, the Everton defender admitted that the manager had long been interested in snapping him up prior to his arrival on Merseyside.
Young and Dyche go way back. While the former is still playing professional football after an illustrious career with some of England’s biggest clubs, the latter has now been in management for years and has become one of the most well-known figures in English football.
However, they surprisingly played together in the past. Dyche was coming close to hanging up his boots as Young emerged from Watford’s youth system and their paths crossed for two years.
Fast forward 18 years and the former Manchester United star has signed for Everton under his former teammate.
Young was criticised when joining the Toffees as many fans thought he was ‘past it’, but he has retained a regular spot in the team and has started all seven of their matches in the Premier League.
Dyche is clearly very fond of the veteran and it comes as no surprise that he was eager to sign Young during his ten-year stint at Burnley.
When asked about working with Dyche, Young said: “It’s brilliant for me. I knew when I was younger, you look at certain players and you wonder which ones are going to be managers and you could tell the way he had the leadership skills and the way he would come in the dressing room, he would have respect of every player there.
“I spoke to him a few years ago as well, he tried to sign me. I knew straight away in the summer after speaking to him that I wanted to sign. I have enjoyed every minute of it.”
Thoughts on Ashley Young at Everton
Every manager has one or two players that they really like and will play in every game no matter what they do – Ashley Young is just that at Goodison Park.
Bar a few errors, Young hasn’t been any worse than most of the Everton players this season and probably deserves his place in the team currently. But that isn’t really a credit to the 38-year-old, but instead displays the Toffees’ lack of quality either side of the backline.
Young, Vitaliy Mykolenko and Nathan Patterson have all been underwhelming this season and Everton really need to strengthen in those positions – or just hope Seamus Coleman comes back an even better player.
Though it wouldn’t surprise me if Sean Dyche continued to start Young anyway. He seems to be quite stubborn in many of his selections, with the gaffer persisting with James Garner out wide and also taking a lot of persuading before he dropped Michael Keane earlier this season.
