It's not a massive gap, but I suppose the difference is that Rovers have the players coming through, whereas Dundalk don't. It's that recruitment that's going to be an issue for Dundalk in the coming couple of years.
It's hard to really compare international and club teams (because club teams can sign players), but let's do it anyway to try put the figures in perspective. Ireland's squad at Euro 2016 was the oldest at 29.4 years. To aul fellas like you and me, that sounds quite young, but for a football team it's very old. It was 0.6 years older on average than any other squad for example. It was really obvious at the time that our squad was over the hill, and we can see the effects in the years since.
Eight of the 24 Euro 2016 squads were older than 27.8 (Dundalk's squad), while only four were younger than 26.7 (Rovers' squad), which gives an indication that maybe Dundalk's and Rovers' squads are at either end of normal. But Dundalk's is at the wrong end of course.
Again, that's not a massively scientific comparison, but I think it's an interesting indication.
On elder statesmen - ye both have ancient keepers (less than a year between Mannus and Rogers), so it doesn't change things if they both get discounted
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