Over the course of the summer, back when Arsenal were looking to offload Lucas Torreira somewhere, the London club were linked with AS Roma’s Amadou Diawara.
It was no secret Mikel Arteta was looking for a more defensive midfielder, with Thomas Partey his first choice.
Other avenues were explored until the Gunners took the decision late in the transfer window to trigger the Ghana international’s release clause at Atlético Madrid and sign him.
Torreira went the other way on loan, leaving Diawara at Roma, where he has struggled for game time, mostly due to being out with Covid-19 for the best part of a month.
Now recovered, the Guinean midfielder has since featured for 10 minutes in a 3-0 win over Parma before watching from the bench as his team were dismantled by Napoli 4-0 away from home.
It certainly isn’t the season he anticipated, playing most of his football in the Europa League, which is why there is now talk of a January move, with Arsenal brought back into the mix.
This comes from Forza Roma, who explain that while Diawara’s plan would be to ‘stay in Rome and finally find his role’, the ‘idea of moving is not that remote yet’.
As they point out, ‘the offers are not lacking’ with ‘at least three Premier League clubs’ interested in his services.
They state ‘one is Arsenal, who had already sought him out last summer’ and ‘interest can come back to life in January’ with Roma willing to listen ‘in case of an important offer’.
For now, however, ‘everything is stopped’ as their new general director, Tiago Pinto, ‘observes him from afar, waiting like Fonseca to understand if December will be the month of his rebirth’.
