Looking for a way out from Aston Villa in January, Leander Dendoncker thought he had found it when Walter Mazzarri told Napoli he wanted the Belgian in his squad.
A quick loan deal was organised with an option to buy at around €10m, but with 21 minutes of football played and him being left out of their Champions League squad, it simply hasn’t worked out.
In fact, it’s turned into a bit of a nightmare for the Aston Villa man, whose situation gets covered by Gazzetta dello Sport on Friday.
They recall that he was an ‘express request’ from Mazzarri, who needed a ‘low midfielder’ also capable of playing centre-back, which is exactly what Dendoncker is.
Both he and Hamed Traorè are labelled as ‘missed promises’, clearly arriving with hope of helping out the Serie A side only to fail in their endeavours.