Gold sets record straight on teenage comment

David Gold has taken the opportunity to clarify comments he made on social media about West Ham’s youth players.

In June the Joint Chairman said on twitter “It’s hard for a teenager to break into the first team and it becomes even harder as the first team gets better but they are, not teenagers forever. dg”

Speaking to Claret And Hugh Associate Editor Sean Whetstone in Exclusive interview he welcomed the opportunity to set the record straight by saying “Just remember what I said, I simply said and I put in brackets ’teenagers’ Teenagers breaking into the first team in the Premier League, the greatest league in the world is difficult, I never said it was impossible, I said it was difficult but that’s not to say when you get to 20 or 21 it starts to get a bit easier. If you take the first game of the season on Friday night you look at that game and tell me how many teenagers were playing in that game, I don’t know but I am pretty confident that they were no teenagers playing in that game, were there 20 year old’s? well possible but that is not a teenager, a teenager is 17, 18 or 19.”

“I think we have one of the best group of young players (at West Ham) for a long, long time without me  being specific, some have come have gone through the academy, some have been bought in but we have some very exciting young players, but are they going to get in the team at 17,18 or 19 ? I doubt it but what they are being groomed to give them the opportunity to break into our team when they get in their twenties and they we will see them blossom”            

Listen to part two of the David Gold Interview on MooreThanJustAPodcast.co.uk below:

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