English Premier League - Player Profile: Ashley Young
Ashley Young was born in Hertfordshire and spent most of his youth in Herford as well. He started off his football career at Watford and is usually played as a winger or a second striker. Young is currently considered one of the brightest English football talents in the English Premier League and his present employers are Aston Villa.
Ashley’s first professional football club was Watford and despite being below par in his displays at Watford’s youth academy, the young Englishman proceeded to improve his game and was finally offered a professional contract by the British football club. Young made his first team debut at Watford in their match against Millwall; he came on as a substitute and scored for Watford during the match.
The speedy winger made five more substitute appearances in the 2003-2004 season and scored three more goals. Young’s best season for Watford was the 2004-2005 season during which he became an integral part of their starting lineup as the club strived to maintain its place in the Championship, which is English football’s second division.
Even though Ashley Young failed to score for Watford during the 2004-2005 season, he managed to provide several assists during the course of the league season which propelled him to earn Watford’s Young Player of the Season award. Aidy Boothroyd took over at Watford before the 2005-2006 season and the new manager deployed Ashley as a striker rather than as a winger, due to the nature of his new position the young Englishman made 41 starts for Watford during the league campaign and scored 15 times for them, including a playoff semi final strike against Crystal Palace.
Young’s heroics secured Watford’s place in the 2006-2007 English Premier League season. He started off the English Premier League season brightly with Watford and scored three times in the beginning of the season, out of which one of the strikers was a long range belter against Fulham F.C. Several club’s were impressed by the strikers ability and in the January transfer window of 2007, U-21 English international was target of three bids by three different clubs, each bid amounted to five million pounds but these bids were rejected by Watford.
A final bid from West Ham was accepted by Watford but Ashley Young refused to a move to the London club and waited for more lucrative offers from better rated English clubs.
On 18th of January 2007, Ashley Young and Watford both agreed to a eight million pound offer from Aston Villa, Villa’s manager Martin O’Neill brought the Englishman to the Birmingham club and soon Ashley made his first team debut in a 3-1 defeat to Newcastle United. Young started the 2007-2008 season in flying colors for Villa and soon earned a call up to the English national football team squad as well
Since his move to Aston Villa, Young has become a complete footballer, his set piece delivery and crossing is one of the best in the English league at the moment. He has also been a speculated target for bigger English clubs such as Arsenal and Liverpool. However, Young has stated his desire to stay at Villa and improve on his performance in the 2009-2010 season, during which he managed to get nine goals and sixteen assists in 45 appearances.
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