Hammers’ age woes

By Dave Langton

West Ham are paying the price for the age of their squad.

The Hammers are spending the international break languishing in the bottom three after their defeat to Everton at Goodison Park last time out.

Boss David Moyes has continually spoken of his desire to bring the average age of the squad down and to attempt to sign players who can inject youth and verve into the side.

But at this stage, it looks like the Hammers are, mostly, a group of old men in football terms!

The average age of the squad is 27.6, which, per Transfermarkt, makes the Irons the joint-oldest team in the division, along with newly-promoted Fulham.

The youngest player in the first-team squad is 22 – Conor Coventry and Ben Johnson – but there are seven players who are 30 or older: Vlad Coufal, Aaron Cresswell, Mikey Antonio, Craig Dawson, Angelo Ogbonna, Darren Randolph, Lukasz Fabianski. Without Randolph, all of those players are in contention to play regularly.

The new signings have gone some way to remedying this: Gianluca Scamacca and Flynn Downes are 23, Maxwel Cornet and Lucas Paqueta are 25, Thilo Kehrer and Nayef Aguerd are 26, Emerson is 28 and Alphonse Areola is 29.

But there is no real verve in these signings; no truly exciting prospects to get you out of your seat.

Look at the likes of Arsenal and Liverpool, who have teenagers who look ready to make the jump into the first-team, and you begin to get a picture of why the Hammers are losing games, and are being outrun to boot.

It’s a genuine concern, and we need to find a way, in future transfer windows, to sort it out.