Willems Signs??

By: Jostein Jensen
Date: 27/02/2001

According to Dutch sources, Menno Willems today signed a 2 year deal with the Mariners, after the club agreed a fee of 500,000 Dutch guilders (around £145,000) with Vitesse Arnhem. It took a while for Willems and Grimsby to agree terms, but Town fans can now see Menno at BP until 2003.

The midfielder becomes Grimsby manager Lennie Lawrence's first permanent signing after the Town boss failed to persuade fellow loanees David Nielsen and Knut Anders Fostervold to join the club. It seems that Grimsby have secured the Dutchman's services for a bargain price, only paying about £145,000 in comparison to the £165,000 fee that had been widely quoted in the media.

The Amsterdam-born midfielder, who will be 24 on the 10th March, has played in 14 league matches while on loan for Grimsby. The transfer fee was believed to be arranged prior to the hard-shooting Dutchman's three month loan spell at Blundell Park. Willems personal demands led to a delay in the negotiations, but it's understood that the player, his agent, and the club brokered a deal sometime today, according to Vitesse sources.

Willems was keen to join the Mariners, having been left out of the Vitesse team prior to his loan spell at Blundell Park. Vitesse's manager and former Dutch captain Ronald Koeman (pictured above) had used Dutch international Marc van Hintum in Willem's place.

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