Matteo Darmian admits a ‘sense of disappointment and regret prevails’ over the Italy squad after their collapse at EURO 2024, eliminated by Switzerland in the Round of 16.
The defender might not have been starting if not for the injury to his Inter teammate Federico Dimarco, but he seemed ill-at-ease on the left flank.
None of the Azzurri appeared comfortable in a dire performance, easily the worst of the tournament that had frankly failed to ever spark to life, but culminated in a heavy 2-0 defeat to Switzerland.
“Now certainly the sense of disappointment and regret prevails, there was the desire and possibility to do better, unfortunately we did not manage to and we have to take responsibility,” Darmian told Sky Sport Italia.
“At this moment it is difficult to explain what went wrong. We can only apologise to everyone, this is all that I can say.”
Darmian had concluded a glorious campaign by winning the Scudetto with Inter, but it ends with a whimper at EURO 2024.
“It is never nice to lose and unfortunately the only prevailing thought right now is disappointment.”
Not only had Italy been the reigning Champions of Europe going into this tournament, they had not failed to reach the quarter-finals of the competition since EURO 2004, when they went out in the group phase.
