That's exactly the problem though. There's too much material. There is far too much that takes place in the 50 or so years after Yavin. There are a TON of people out there who are fans of Star Wars that have zero interest in the Expanded Universe; you can't market a movie to these people when they have to learn all of this crap about the Jaina being the Sword of the Jedi and Jacen becoming Darth Caedus. Try explaining the Vong War to someone who has only seen the two trilogies, or to a kid that watches Clone Wars on Cartoon Network. It's all too complicated to easily convey in the opening crawl of Episode VII.
If they're going to keep all of the EU material, they have to set the new trilogy in a significantly later time period where much of what happened in post-OT material is largely irrelevant, like maybe 200-1000 years later.
Oh, and people really should give up on the Thrawn Trilogy being the template for the new movies; they take place only 5 years after Return of the Jedi, a movie that was made nearly 29 years ago. All of the principal actors are much, much older.