Thomas Partey has been an ever-present for Arsenal since the club activated his release clause to acquire his services from Atletico Madrid. Despite being a vital cog in the Arsenal midfield engine, Partey’s career with the Gunners has been plagued with a litany of injuries, which has kept Arsenal fans on the edge in regard to his fitness issues. In the concluded campaign, Partey was quite lucky on the injury front, only missing out on five Premier League games, with his only layoff coming in mid-season when he had some damaged ribs.
The tail end of last season saw Partey suffer a major dip in his form, with it culminating in the 2-2 draw with West Ham, where he lost the ball to Declan Rice in the midfield, allowing his future Arsenal teammate tee up Jarrod Bowen that was fouled by Gabriel. Partey was a shadow of his usual great self when the Gunners visited the Etihad Stadium, and when Arteta attempted to re-vitalize his play, playing him as a right back to invert in midfield, his performances looked very lethargic, which was somewhat surprising, as Partey was one of the backbones of the team, as he helped us tick, dictating tempo in midfield, breaking up plays, progressing the ball and being dominant in the center of the park.
Arsenal went in hard for Declan Rice and it’s fair to assume that Partey would be threatened by the imminent arrival of the superstar English holding midfielder. It was evident that his partner-in-crime, Granit Xhaka, was set to leave the club, and with Arsenal securing Rice, Xhaka moved to Bayer Leverkusen, and the expectation was that Rice was going to play alongside Thomas Partey in what will be quite a dominant midfield, but with the latest whispers circulating the tabloids, it seems that the Ghanaian lynchpin may be following Xhaka through the exit door, as it has been reported that Al Nassr, Al Ahli and Al Khaleej are clearly interested in signing Partey for a big-money move.
The Saudi Pro League has been on the ascendancy with the acquisitions of a vast array of talent from Europe, so the temptation is there for Partey, as he will be offered vast amounts of money that will allow him live the dream. The quality of football in the Saudi Pro League will not be as grueling and tasking as the Premier League, so the prospects look good for Partey, should he make the choice to jump ship to join the Saudi bandwagon.
Even if Partey may or may not be interested with a move to Saudi Arabia, what is Arsenal’s take on it?
Mikel Arteta has made it crystal clear that he wants to keep Partey, and also hinted that the Ghanaian lynchpin wants to stay at the club,
“Every time I spoke to him, every time I’ve had conversations with him, he’s wanted to stay with us, so there’s nothing there at all.
“They can play together and that was in my plans. If you want to improve the squad and have more quality, we need players that can play together, but we need players in the same position that have to fight for their places.
“It’s something that we haven’t had over the last few years and we wanted to improve that, and that’s why we brought Declan as well.”
Arsenal has four competitions to feature on this season, and Arteta will have the likes of Rice, Partey, Jorginho and even Mohamed Elneny to chose from. There is also Sambi Albert Lokonga, who would be looking to make a move to Burnley to join Vincent Kompany.
Having Partey and Rice in central midfield gives extra security in the middle of the park and we can benefit exponentially for having them together.
I’m very elated that Arsenal will continue to Partey after Partey.
Follow Gooner Daily on Twitter @goonerdaily.
Visit Gooner Daily’s Facebook page.
Click on the “Follow button” to join Gooner Daily’s Mailing List
Leave a Reply