I was delighted that we signed Matteo Darmian. I haven't posted on here in a while, but I was really pleased about us signing him after everything I had seen from him. I have always followed Italian football and Darmian had really proven himself in both Serie A and Serie B. One of the traits that I always really liked about him, is that he is a front-foot defender. He was always someone who would anticipate rather than react, and always committed in the challenge as well as when going forward.
He has shown this for us so far too, great levels of stamina going back and forward and it's important to remember that he is a truly responsible player. He covers for the CBs really well, and he has leadership skills which will improve as he becomes more comfortable with the language (he was given the captaincy at times for Torino). Always seemed like a great professional too, purely dedicated to his football and being let go by Milan at a young age seemed to have strengthened his resolve to be a top player.
No-one can doubt his pedigree in my opinion, even when we signed him I was really surprised by people claiming to have never seen him play, or never heard of him or even that we should be aiming higher. He won Italian international team player of the year for 2014, and he was outstanding in the league for Torino too. I actually watched his debut for Italy vs Ireland at Craven Cottage last June (0-0, not a great game) but he played well that night and was great at the World Cup too. Hoping to see him really make that right back position his own for us, hopefully for many years to come.