On the surface, it comes across as if the deal Arsenal struck for Thomas Partey was a last minute one. However, it is the extreme contrary considering the amount of hours that preceded the decision to sign Thomas Partey.

15 months ago, Former Arsenal midfielder Edu was appointed as the club's first technical director. The motivation behind the appointment was to spark the development of a new football infrastructure that will take the club forward.

Edu's primary roles as technical director included overseeing the work of first-team coaches, the academy and player scouting and recruitment. As a result, the 42-year-old played a massive role in the transfer of Partey.

Despite researching on the Ghanaian, Edu still needed approval from the board because it was a difficult deal.

"When I received the green light from the board and the owners," he said. "To be fair, it is a huge investment for this moment which we are in now and of course we need the green light from them. 

Even though Covid-19 posed financial problems for clubs around Europe, Arsenal were able to economically dig deep and make the Partey deal possible.

"When I showed my plan to them, they were so excited, they understand the plan and pressed the green button and then I felt very, very confident because it is not easy to invest a lot of money in this period of time."