Still sat behind me... Someone else near me said that Shaw is too young to play football at this level??
The media wouldn't even be mentioning their age, if they were actually any good. It's because they're not, that everyone looks at their age. If you're good enough, you're old enough, regardless. Slightly different if they were all 17 and 18 year olds, but they're not. A lot I think are 20 or 21 or 22. On the other hand, Shaw, Clyne, Jay, Cork etc are good enough.
We are pretty much the same average age http://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/en/premier-league/altersschnitt/wettbewerb_GB1.html
Well, yeah, exactly. Shaw and Clyne are both younger than Lowton and Bennett, but age is mentioned with the latter more with the senior - well, they do with Shaw, but then he is six years younger than the rest of them (which is just ridiculous). Westwood will be the same age as Cork and Morgan on his birthday tomorrow, Bannan and Delph already are. Benteke is only a year younger than Rodriguez, Ciaran Clark is only a year younger than Maya, Mark Albrighton is older than Gaston, etc etc. To call Villa's team a group of promising youngsters but not ours ties in with what you've said about them not actually being very good at the moment. Despite being pretty much the same age, ours aren't "promising" youngsters - they're good enough already.
Like our Dutch year. When you're losing games badly the positive spin is to look at the young squad and call it a learning curve. Of course age & experience are not necessarily related. Cork/Morgan/Clyne/Rodriguez have been 1st team regulars at lower levels for at least the last 3 years. I confess to not knowing much about the individual histories of the Villa players but I doubt they have seen as much game time. I do know Delph has barely played for someone who started his career so young and with such promise.
Agree about our players already being good enough so not being touted as "promising", but given their ages you would think there is scope for improvement which could mean they are promising, potential world beaters. Maybe I'm getting ahead of myself Villa have 2 maybe 3 players I rate, Westwood and Weimann definitely and possibly Lowton, the rest I wouldn't be surprised to see slip down the leagues. Benteke won't but I don't think hes very good anyway, I do have a bit of a dislike for large, technically not great strikers though so could just be me.