Proud captain Damien Johnson is confident tonight’s terrifying encounter against European superheavyweights Italy will prove a worthwhile exercise for boss Nigel Worthington.

The Birmingham City ace, who will wear the armband in place of regular skipper Aaron Hughes at the Arena Garibaldi Stadium, believes Worthington will be able to unearth stars for the future.

Rookies Chris Casement, Colin Coates, Andy Little, Corry Evans and Stephen Carson will all start and therefore have a big chance to impress the boss.

On the last end of season tour to the United States three years ago, then manager Lawrie Sanchez gave Sammy Clingan and Kyle Lafferty their debuts in the magnificent Giants Stadium, New Jersey and those two players have been in the senior international squad every since.

Johnson, set to play at right- back tonight to bring much needed maturity and composure to an otherwise inexperienced back four, expects something similar to happen on this trip.

The 30-year-old says: “This is a good opportunity for Nigel to see who is waiting in the wings and give those boys who would maybe not be associated with the senior squad some valuable experience.

“This is going to be a tough, tough game. They always are against a quality side like Italy. Thankfully though there is not the added extra pressure of going for World Cup points.

“I’ll be playing at right-back and while it’s not where I normally play, I have played there before so it won’t be unusual for me. The manager asked me to drop back for this game due to fact we are missing so many regular senior players and I’m happy to do that.

“I’m certainly not disappointed Italy has selected a weakened squad, in fact I view their team to be very strong.”

This will be the second time outstanding servant Johnson, who was hampered by injury last season, has captained his country.

At the end of March he led Northern Ireland to a crucial World Cup qualifying victory over Poland at Windsor Park on his 50th appearance, but the Lisburn lad is realistic in accepting that a similar result will only occur if there is a minor miracle.

Italy’s team, inexperienced in the form of eight new caps and the fact most of the squad are new to international football, is still capable of producing devastating football. All the players perform for decent clubs in Serie A.

“I said at the time, captaining Northern Ireland was one of the proudest moments of my career. And to be given the armband again is very pleasing when the manager could have picked either Grant McCann or David Healy,” said Johnson.

“I’m just glad to be back involved in the Northern Ireland set-up and grateful to Nigel for giving me the chance to play again.

“I maybe didn’t play as many games as I would have liked for Birmingham last season and indeed my season was probably only getting started when it came to an end.

“Now we are in the Premier League and that’s excellent news for the club, but really, I haven’t given it too much thought. One thing I do know is that we go back to pre-season a week later than if we had have remained in the Championship.

“Now though we concentrate on Italy and I just hope we can put in a decent performance.”