Arsenal coach, Mikel Arteta is quite impressed with the performance of Thomas Partey on his first start for the club in the Europa League clash against Rapid Vienna.
Thomas Partey had a monster 2nd half 🔥 pic.twitter.com/7681GaWnwN
— Partey Time 🥳 (@ItsParteySzn) October 22, 2020
Arsenal came from behind to win the match 2-1.
The Ghanian made quite an impression on his full debut for the club on Thursday night. Expressing his delight over the new signing’s display against the Austrian outfit, Arteta said he looked really solid and really comfortable.
“I think he held the midfield by himself in the second half when we were a little more open and started to take more chances and attacking certain spaces with some players. But I think he was fantastic tonight and there is much more to come from him.
“But he needs his team-mates around him. It’s not about him. We know that with the price that we paid for him and the profile of the player that he is, that he’s going to have a lot of people looking at him every single game.
“But this is about the structure we have as a team and the flow, the unity and the cohesion that we need in our team and he is one piece of that and hopefully he’s a big piece,” he told the club’s website.
Partey gave out a man of the match performance against Rapid Vienna
Partey was the highlight of the night. The midfielder oozed class, breaking up play with well-timed tackles.
He also got the ball forward with calm and accurate passes and was as well alert to any danger posed by the hosts.
He was also involved in the crucial intervention in the first half when he prodded the ball from under the feet of Taxiarchis Fountas when the striker was about to shoot.
His performance did not only catch the attention of Arteta but that of BT Sports pundit and former Manchester United midfielder, Owen Hargreaves as well. The former England midfielder described his display as one of the best debuts he has ever seen.
According to former England and Chelsea winger Karen Carney, Partey is a key ingredient of what Arsenal have been missing for years.
“He has a knack of breaking up play and keeping the momentum going. He is pure class. He is versatile and tactically astute, gives more balance and is technically very good.
“He is brilliant and Arsenal fans will be overjoyed to see him in this team,” he stated this while commentating on the game for BT Sport.
Partey was eventually awarded the Man of the Match award for his display. He is now expected to be in the starting line up for Arsenal’s next game – a Premier League action on Sunday, 25 October (19:15 BST) at the Emirate Stadium when they host Leicester City.
He could make it a double impressive full debut as well against Brendan Rodgers’ men, who spanked Manchester City 5-2 on their turf few weeks ago.
Thomas Partey stats on his Arsenal full debut
Partey was given a rating of 7.41 out of ten in a match he tourched the ball 102 times, and won 100 percent of his tackles ( 5/5).
Other stats are:
Aerial Duels Won – 4/5
Shots – 1
Key Passes – 1
Dribbles – 1
Interceptions – 1
Completed passes: 83
Duels won: 10/13
Possession gained: 8
Clearances: 1
Pass Accuracy – 90%
In the first half, he recorded :
100% aerials battle
• 3 tackles (100% success rate)
• Touches: 47 •
Completed passes: 39 (95.1% successful).
• Duels won: 6/7
• Interceptions: 1
• Clearances: 1
• Possession gained: 1
• Yellow cards: 1
