Manchester United’s Ashley Young and Spurs’ Dele Alli were involved in a 30-minute mark spat where both the players had verbal exchanges and kind of mocked each other. This incident started after Young was caught in the face by Spurs right-back Serge Aurier. Alli targeted Young by telling him to ‘retire with a zimmer frame’ and to that the United player told Alli ‘let me know when you win the Prem.’
This is a perfect example of a verbal duel where both rivals took digs at each other’s personal careers and if reports are to be believed then the verbals continued inside the tunnel as well. But from a totally neutral perspective, this was something that the game needed very badly. Before this incident, the match was a very cagey affair where both the teams were playing with a degree of wariness. After this spat though both sections of the fans opened up – resulting in a complete change of atmosphere within the stadium.
Now, pundit Gary Neville explains why Ashley Young’s verbal duel with Alli might have been well thought off. According to Neville, Young was trying to provoke the tumultuous Alli – who has had a history of losing his cool and getting into the bad books of the referee.
While commentating for SkySports Neville said, “Ashley Young knows exactly what he is doing and there might have been a time when Dele Allii would have reacted and thrown his head forward, but he hasn’t,
“His [Alli’s] heart would have been saying ‘I want to break your nose,’ his head would have been saying, ‘don’t lose the game for my team.”
