Arsenal have approached former midfielder Edu Gaspar for the role of Director of Football.
The North London club continue on their path to rehabilitation after the exit of Arsene Wenger last summer and Ivan Gazidis leaving for AC Milan last month.
Arsene Wenger tended to control most of the footballing decisions at Arsenal, before being replaced by Unai Emery.
After Gazidis’s shock exit to AC Milan, Raul Sanllehi was promoted to the head of football job, with Vinai Venkatesham moving from chief commercial officer to managing director with Sven Mislintat continuing as the head of recruitment.
Edu, a fan favourite at his time with the Gunners, won two trophies with the club between 2001 and 2005, including the legendary invincible season, making 127 appearances for the club. In 2005, he joined Valencia before leaving for leaving for boyhood club Corinthians in 2009.
After taking retirement in 2010, he took over the role of director of football at Corinthians and has since become the technical director of the Brazil national team.
It is understood that contact has been made between Edu and Arsenal. Reports in Brazil stated that the Brazilian has been offered the job with Brazil’s football association being aware about the situation, but there has been no word from the 40-year-old’s side.
It is reported that Unai Emery is ‘relaxed’ about the situation, given he worked under similar structures at Paris Saint-Germain.
The hunt for a director of football continues for Arsenal this transfer season as they travel to West Ham for a North London Derby.
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It has been quite a season for Arsenal. A season with a lot of restructuring on and off the field. But there are a lot of positives to be taken from that and it makes us say that that we are moving in a positive direction.
A director of football is an important position in a football club. It is because we want to have a structure in place where we have a vision in mind and we can give the manager the proper environment and finances to work with. Moreover in quite a few cases recently we have seen that what a director of football’s absence can do to a football club.
Hence the fact that Arsenal are looking to put in more faces behind the scenes and with people who can actually make a difference, does make a lot of sense.
Edu, having previously worked as the director of football at Corinthians, has certainly got the experience for the job. And also being a former Arsenal player and an invincible at that, it will most certainly be an onus to have him in the job simply because he knows the club, he knows the fans and truly understands the values on which the club was built. Fairly certain to say that if the move does materialise, the Gunners will surely have made the right move in the forward direction and with the right thinking behind all of it.
