Date Of Birth – 18 September 1983
Place Of Birth – Adamstown, Co. Wexford, Ireland.
Clubs – St Pats, Cork City, Reading, Wolves
Int Caps – 28
Int Goals – 7
This fella is without doubt one of the best players to have worn the old gold in years. There were mixed feelings about his signing in the summer, most were positive but some doubted whether one good Premiership season for Reading justified smashing our transfer fee record. Surely no one can now doubt the £6.5mil fee, even those who are old enough to remember the first £1mil player or indeed the first 100k player.
What makes Doyle so special? Well, after watching the Wolves for many a year one thing has always struck me as a necessity, hard work. Let’s face it, Berbatov wouldn’t last 2 minutes down the Molineux. Doyle, as Mick would put it, puts a shift in. This has been particularly important of late as the Wolves persist with a 4-5-1 formation.
His touch is absolutely outstanding. I haven’t seen the ball stick to a player at the Molineux quite like how it does to Doyler. This coupled with his freakish strength for a player of medium build and height makes him a suprisingly effective outlet, whether it be to head, chest or foot.
His final ball has been excellent also, whether it be a pass or a finish. His strike against Everton was cool and calculated, his through ball for Jarvis’ ‘penalty’ against Spurs was precise, his calmness against Burnley was crucial and the list goes on and on.
I was in the home end at Eastlands when he made his debut and I struggled to hide my delight as he troubled the City back line. I didn’t expect him to go on and become such a class act for the Wolves.
Long may it continue. UTW.
He certainly is Superman. It never fails to amaze me how good he is, I seem to spend most of the game shaking my head is disbelief as he wins another ball that I thought he had no chance of getting to. People talk about how strong Drogba is and that he’s one of the hardest players to defend against but I think Doyle is just as good. But I’m slightly biased.
I just hope we have the pleasure of watching him next season. Don’t know if it’s just me with my rose tinted glasses on again but I think he’ll stick around if we do go down. He seems to enjoy playing for us and seems like the sort of guy who’d be happy to stick around and get us back up.
He’s not quite as good as Drogba, but he’s just as valuable to us as the Ivorian is to Chelsea. We’d be snookered big style without him in the side.
I certainly haven’t seen a better all round striker at the Wolves for a very long time (if ever).
Unfortunately though Nick, he will 100% be on his bike if we go down. I’d be staggered if it wasn’t in his contract that he could move on for a set fee if Wolves got relegated. He’s a proven Premiership footballer and although he’s a loyal bloke, there’s no way he should be spending another season in the fizzy.
To keep him, we absolutely need to stay up.
I don’t see why he’d leave straight away, he stuck around at Reading for a year after they went down. I suppose he’d been there longer though and probably felt more attached to the club. Hopefully it won’t come to that though as we’ll stay up and sign someone equally as good to play along side him.
I think Doyle would definately be off. I think plenty of teams would be in for him and to be honest he doesn’t deserve to waste a year of his career in the Championship
The guy is our best player by a country mile this season. A joy to watch.
We need to stay up to keep him!
Needs a song!
By the way Kwolf, thanks for putting the post together. Takes the load off me and Ben, which is very much appreciated.
Anyone else who fancies giving it a go, feel free and I’ll stick up your article for everyone to see.
Yes, cheers Kwolf.
I remember vividly the evening that Sky Sports News brought out the old yellow ticker bar along the bottom of the screen.
I looked at it with an element of curiosity and dejection as I expected some breaking news about one of the big boys.
It read BREAKING NEWS: Kevin Doyle agrees to sign for Wolves in the region of £6.5 million.
The time it took for the bar to scroll from the words ‘signs for’ and ‘Wolves’ felt like a bloody eternity.
For a hundreth of a second my mind had said “Fuck me, I knew he’d sign for Sunder…….GET IN THERE!!!”
Hear ! Hear ! Player of the Season !
I dont want to dream of where we will be next season – but if we stay up and find a partner for Doyle we would have one helluva a deadly frontline
4-5-1 it is until then though… although I have knocked Keogh for his scoring (dis)ability he is a gifted forward and brilliant playmaker and look fwd to seeing him mix it up with the new strategy
Head and shoulders our player of the season…..whatever happens from this point on….
Would have loved to have seen him link up with Stephen Hunt again but I’ll take each match as it comes now. This season has proved I know fuck all about Wolves, football, players, betting and Tottenham.
Kick in the bollocks coming up but I can take it now……I’ve been broken in nicely to the Prem now and it feels like home already……
I wonder what SEB would think about this post? This time last year Mr Blake people might have said the same about you!
Totally agree about Doyle though – great first touch and wins headers that a bloke of his size just shouldn’t get near! Couldn’t see him in a top six side, but a different class to the rest of our squad and could easily step up to the next tier of mid-table premier league teams.
Marty Wolf – maybe he can link up with Hunt again when Hull get relegated and we stay up? (fingers crossed, I doubt it but it would be nice!) £3million will probably do it then – enough to cover Phil Browns account at the local sunbed centre!!!!
It must be a hard pill for SEB to swallow. I feel sorry for him I must admit. Would love nothing more than to see him smash a few goals in to help keep us up.
I disagree about Doyle not being good enough for a top six side. He’d struggle at one of the big, big boys but he’s better than anything Villa have up front and he’d be an excellent partner for Defoe at Spurs. In fact, I’m sure both of those sides showed an interest in the summer, but didn’t show their hand until much later in the chase, thankfully!
I agree Thomas, if he’s the stand out player in our team then why can’t he step up with better players? I reckon he could do well at Liverpool, maybe step in when Torres is injured and would fit in at Villa and Spurs. Of course, i want him to stay here.
Drogba is a big uncouth cry baby loudmouth ignorant bonehead, and is made to look good by those around him.
If he’s that much of a superman why wasnt he lifting the africa cup of nations thingy recently?
Doyle is streets ahead of most of the other forwards in the prem, with the exception of perhaps Rooney and one or two others.
Put him in a top four team, like he will be next season as we challenge for a Champions League place, and he will score and create lottsa goals.
No, I’m not dreaming. Did any Spurs fan think this time last year they would where they are now?
If they can dream so can we!!!
FOWB
Clive! Are you feeling OK, if I’m not mistaken you’ve actually said something positive. Shows how good Doyle is when you’re singing his praises.
You’re right about Drogba, I’d rather have Doyle any day. He works twice as hard as him without making half the fuss. Doyle might not score as many goals but surely thats down to being in a poorer team.
I also think at the moment I wouldn’t swap Hanneman for any othe keeper in the premiership. That guy’s been immense, considering no one expected him to be anything other than an under study to Hennesey, he’s really risen to the challenge. Even though he’s not that tall for a keeper he’s quality at winning the ball in the air. That early save against Spurs when their man was clean through was istrumental in us winning that game, seemed to go a bit unoticed with the other outstanding performances. If they’d have scored early it would have been a much different game.
Thankyou Reading.
Sorry if I’m talking bollocks, I’ve been drinking through the night. Unlike Ed I don’t get offensive after a few beers.:-)
Sorry Scooped smiley face didn’t work, feel like I’ve let you down now after you went out of your way to teach it me.
Actually if you’d paid any attention recently you would have seen that Drogba does a lot of fantastic charity work for his homeland, and while he may be a big baby on the pitch, slagging him off as a human being is out of order.
However DOYLE IS SUPERMAN!
Thanks for putting my contribution up lads. I have an idea for another which i might pass on to you next week. Anything to keep us interested while we wait what seems like an eternity for our next game! I watch a lot of R.O.I matches and see them play live a few times a year normally. I’m don’t know why i’m so pleasantly suprised that Doyle has been a success as he’s been one of Ireland’s stand out performers over the last few years. If you ask most Irish fans if they had to have either Doyle or Keane upfront you’d be suprised at how many would plump for Doyler. Against Spurs lots of other players stepped up to the mark, the new Algerian lad, David Jones and Matty Jarvis in particular. I think that our survival this season is very much dependant on whether the other lads continue to do so as I have little doubt that even if Doyle has an off day he will still contribute massively to the team.
the bit on the interview where Mick says ‘I enjoyed… that conversation’ is pure Alan Partridge
If Doyle leaves, we only have ourselves to blame for not giving him the same quality in midfield and defence.