Maneskin’s Damiano David flashes triumphant peace signs on return to Italy after Eurovision win – as he denies drug allegations

Eurovision winners Maneskin returned to Rome to airport pandemonium after claiming the song contest’s top prize over the weekend.

In scenes we’ve not seen in a while thanks to Covid-19, fans gathered in the arrivals hall and outside to give the group the warmest of welcomes home as they returned to Italy triumphant in their Eurovision attempts.

The band – made up of Damiano David, Victoria De Angelis, Thomas Raggi and Ethan Torchio – were escorted by police as fans awaited their return on Sunday as they jumped into press interviews.

Not worried about the fanfare, Damiano took a seat to have a cigarette outside the entrance, as he was joined by his bandmates, looking thrilled to be back home after a wild weekend owning the stage.

Maneskin won this year’s competition with their entry Zitti e buoni scoring a staggering 524 points, far ahead of the UK’s entry with James Newman suffering a devastating defeat with nil points.

Clearly in great spirits after their victorious win, members sported wide grins and waved to supporters holding signs outside the airport, with Damiano throwing peace signs to cameras.

However, their return is surrounded by controversy with Damiano strongly rebutting claims he was taking drugs during the event, saying that footage from the final was of him picking up broken glass – doubling down this morning on his offer to take a drug test.

Appearing on BBC Breakfast on Monday, the group continued to deny the claims with Damiano saying he was ‘really offended’ by the speculation, as it overshadowed their momentous win.

Damiano said that he was inspecting a broken glass on the table and leant down towards it when cameras focused on the group.

‘When I was cheering, I saw the glass broken and I was like, “My God what happened?”’ he recalled.

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He added: ‘I feel really offended, I think that these kind of things are outrageous. We’re young guys with huge passion for the music and this is actually overshadowing our win.

‘We will get drug tested to prove it’s all speculation.’

Fellow band member Victoria added that the accusations makes them ‘upset’.

‘We’re trying to spread our music and a positive message and we’ve never had use of drugs,’ she told the programme. ‘We really don’t want to spread this kind of message.’

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