Eddie Howe has revealed that the "best thing" about signing Bruno Guimaraes was how quickly he and his coaching staff warmed to his personality.
The Newcastle United head coach says that the speed of the transfer meant that he could not do all of the research on the midfielder he would have liked. But insists he was never in doubt about the quality of the World Cup-bound Brazil international.
Howe said: "I watched him a lot and really liked him as a player. Then of course the difficult thing with him playing in France was to get to know him before we signed him.
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"That's always the risk. We did as much homework as we could and tried to find out about him as a personality and him as a person. The best thing upon signing him was not just his ability, but finding what he's like as a person and a guy - we instantly loved him.
"I am loving the responsibility of coaching him and managing him. You just get such as good feel from him, he's such a positive person. That's without talking about what a great player he is and how good he is. So it's been a brilliant transfer for us."
Bruno was many people's pick for man of the match in the season's opening win against Nottingham Forest and has started the season in style. But Howe insists his form at Newcastle is limitless.
Howe, speaking to ESPN Brasil, said: "I would not put a ceiling on what he could be. He has a brilliant mix of qualities of what he could bring to the Premier League, so he's got the technical ability to take the ball in any situation, an eye for a pass both short and long and he's got a brilliant engine and you need to keep up physically with the game."
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