Ashley Young warns Conte appointment at Man Utd would be 'a disaster' given squad's running stats

Ashley Young has warned Manchester United that appointing Antonio Conte as manager could be “a disaster”, pointing to the squad’s well-documented lack of running as a fundamental mismatch with the Italian’s coaching methods.

The former United winger, who spent 18 months under Conte at Inter Milan, made the remarks as Conte’s name resurfaced in connection with the Old Trafford job. Michael Carrick’s position has come under increasing scrutiny after United’s 4-1 Champions League defeat at Como on Wednesday — the club’s seventh consecutive game without a win.

Speaking on The Overlap Daily, Young was asked whether Conte was a genuine target or whether the Italian’s camp was engineering the speculation themselves. “I’d go with the second one,” he said. “I think linking himself to the job, saying that big clubs, he wants to get the history back and whatnot.”

Young painted a vivid picture of life under Conte, describing the coach as relentlessly intense. “He’s crazy, by the way. Like he is crazy. He’s a bit like Diego Simeone on the sidelines. You hear him non-stop,” he said. “Meetings were long. When I say long, I’m talking — if we lost the game, we could go in and do the meeting after the game and it stops literally everything and you could be there for three, four hours.”

That intensity, Young suggested, is precisely why Conte’s tenures tend to be short-lived. “I think that’s one of the reasons why he doesn’t last long at places — because not just the players, he tries to test mentally, but the board as well and the owners.”

The warning became most pointed when Young turned to the subject of United’s fitness. “There has been a lot of talk about Man United’s running stats,” he said. “If they’re not going to run and Antonio Conte goes in there, it’s going to be a disaster.”

Conte’s reputation as one of football’s most demanding fitness coaches is well established. During his first pre-season at Tottenham in 2022, reports emerged of punishing sessions in Seoul that left Harry Kane vomiting and Son Heung-min collapsing in front of a home crowd. He also helped Romelu Lukaku — a former United striker — shed significant weight and improve his conditioning during their time together at Inter.

Young, who retired earlier this year at Ipswich Town at the age of 40, was well placed to assess the cultural fit between Conte’s methods and a United squad that Carrick himself has publicly criticised for insufficient effort.