Gilles De Bilde “The Animal”

[owlinexile]

10 hours ago, Owls-Fan said:

I remember that summer we were linked with lots of strikers like Hartson and Huckerby, and then suddenly signed De Bilde and Sibon.  Turned out they weren’t as good as we needed them to be replacing the void of Di Canio 

 

I remember having a ding dong on here with Rob Staton where he said we should sign De Bilde and I said we should sign Robbie Keane from then-Championship Wolves.

 

Not that I hold onto things for a long time or anything.

[Paolo Coopio]

2 hours ago, The Night-Owl said:

Never saw the best of De Bilde, thought he was going to a decent signing but Degryse was a class player that I liked watching, was gutting that Degryse didn't stick around longer

 

I think Degryse also played in a better team at the time to some extent. We still had Waddle, Hirst, Bright doing quite well. Although he was obviously quality.

 

Why did Degryse only hang around one season? Does anyone know why? Bit like Trustfull. Did well but didnt really settle and hang around.

[Owls-Fan]

3 minutes ago, owlinexile said:

 

I remember having a ding dong on here with Rob Staton where he said we should sign De Bilde and I said we should sign Robbie Keane from then-Championship Wolves.

 

Not that I hold onto things for a long time or anything.

Yes Keane was another striker we could have signed, I think that was the summer we were trying to sign Dani too, before he went to Barca.  And we ended up with De Bilde and Sibon, not ideal. All goes back to hiring Wilson as manager the summer before,  a terrible decision.  

[horny owl]

Typical Wednesday signing

 

On big wages but absolutely rubbish

 

We never learned from our mistakes

[Gob_Bluth]

1 hour ago, Paolo Coopio said:

Why did Degryse only hang around one season? Does anyone know why? Bit like Trustfull. Did well but didnt really settle and hang around.

 

IIRC he was early 30's when he was here, got an offer from PSV, chance to play European football and Dutch football was decently thought of back then.

We got our money back on him leaving too i think

[NorfolkNChance]

An extract from his autobiography and coped from this article - https://www.wsc.co.uk/the-archive/30-Clubs/8298-manning-the-barricades

 

High wages were retained in Division One – among those on long, costly contracts were Gerald Sibon, Andy Hinchcliffe and Gilles de Bilde – while the flow of vital TV money was cut. "[Money] was the only reason we were still playing in England," wrote De Bilde in his autobiography. "Each of us made a drawing of how he saw his future. I drew a nice villa in Spain with a waiter serving me while a plane dropped pounds over me." Less splendidly for the club, another relegation came in 2003.

[George]

'Animal' is a term that makes people think of a jackal or some sort of vicious crazed beast and that is what we thought we were getting. We would have done well to remember that a sloth is also an animal.

[malek]

17 hours ago, Owls-Fan said:

Yes Keane was another striker we could have signed, I think that was the summer we were trying to sign Dani too, before he went to Barca.  And we ended up with De Bilde and Sibon, not ideal. All goes back to hiring Wilson as manager the summer before,  a terrible decision.  

 

I remember reading statement from then Wolves manager (McGhee ?!) in either Match or Shoot magazine that we have as much chance of signing Robbie Keane as they have of signing Robbie Fowler. Think it shows how realistic chance we got.

[owlinexile]

1 hour ago, malek said:

 

I remember reading statement from then Wolves manager (McGhee ?!) in either Match or Shoot magazine that we have as much chance of signing Robbie Keane as they have of signing Robbie Fowler. Think it shows how realistic chance we got.

 

But then he went to Coventry.

[malek]

29 minutes ago, owlinexile said:

 

But then he went to Coventry.

 

Couple of years later and for 7m. I believe it was considerably more than what we offered.