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Manchester United's new young generation have it tougher to succeed than Louis van Gaal’s all-conquering Ajax side of 1995 says the Reds boss.

When Van Gaal took over at the Amsterdam club in ‘91 he began creating a youthful side who became the best in Ajax’s history.

By ‘95 the Dutch club had won the Eredivisie title without losing a match, they cleaned up domestically and won the Champions League beating the then Italian and Euro super power AC Milan in the final.

The golden generation contained 21-year-old’s Edgar Davids and Marc Overmars. Clarence Seedorf was just 19 and Patrick Kluivert who was the Dutch League’s top scorer that campaign and came on against Milan to score the Euro winner was 18.

Now Van Gaal has assembled Memphis Depay (21), Anthony Martial (19), Andreas Pereira, who made a goalscoring senior debut against Ipswich in the League Cup, is 19 and the injured Luke Shaw is 20.

In pictures: United v Ipswich

The core of his new look United squad mirrors the age of his Ajax stars.

But Van Gaal says the modern day youngsters has a harder route to the top.“Of course, you can compare players with each other. But this is another generation,” says the United boss.

“At that time Kluivert and Davids did not have Iphones for example. Now for example all the time we have Iphones in our hands. This is a different period and also the pressure nowadays is more. I think in the Premier League it is much more.

“So it is difficult to compare. But of course you can compare Martial with Kluivert. You can do that. Because Kluivert was also a fantastic, athletic figure and scored goals right from the beginning. But you can’t compare the periods or the pressure in the game.

“It is now much harder. And for my children it is much harder to make the right choices. Because they live in this computer period when you push the button and the whole world is in front of you. And so are the choices.

“When I was young I only had the choices between the minister of the church and the doctor who was coming along and then the family. And now my daughters have to choose between a lot of aspects in this world so nowadays much more difficult to make the right choices.

“Also for the football players it’s much more difficult than say 10 years ago because the rhythm of the game is much higher so the time and the space you have to create as a player to decide is much shorter so much more difficult.

“That’s why I have to say that you cannot compare generations like Davids or Kluivert with Martial or Pereira.”

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