Arsenal’s new midfielder Rosa Kafaji has a confession. “Something controversial about me: I haven’t watched that much football because I was mostly outside playing,” she says. “So, I didn’t watch much football, but I know Arsenal is a big club that has had some big players – players like Thierry Henry.”
Kafaji, widely recognised as one of the best young talents in Europe, has arrived at Arsenal with a lot of hype. The 21-year-old can be forgiven for having been glued to a pitch rather than a screen, because the result has been a dynamism on the ball few can match.
“Ronaldinho has been an inspiration since I was younger and that’s how I am trying to play like,” she says. “I want to be creative, have fun on the pitch, try to score and create chances.”
Arsenal’s manager, Jonas Eidevall, a fellow Swede, said it was “no surprise” she idolised the Brazilian. “They have some similarities when they play,” he said. “She’s a proper baller. The things she can do with a ball is probably going to break the leg of other people trying. So she obviously gives us some really good qualities in our attacking play. She can open up in small spaces and she can put in balls with exact precision. I think we needed that.
“I’ve seen Rosa play since she was young, first at AIK in Sweden and then at Häcken. I didn’t know her as a person, so I went over to Sweden and met with her before we signed her. We spent time just speaking, getting to know her and understanding our motivations. And I was crystal clear after that meeting that she was going to be a perfect fit for us.”
Kafaji will head back to Gothenburg sooner than expected, with Arsenal drawn against Häcken in the second round of Champions League qualifying. The first leg is in Sweden on Wednesday, the return at Meadow Park the following Thursday.
“It’s crazy to be playing against my old team – I was only there two months ago,” she says. “It’s nice to be going back. My former teammates sent messages to me about the game. They said that they thought they would draw Arsenal.”
Eidevall hopes Arsenal can take Kafaji to the next level. He knew she was good but when he saw how she reacted to a training drill against a low block, he really started to understand the talent at his disposal.
“We do one thing where one team is just entirely in low block, and we give that attacking team not a certain amount of time, but a limited number of balls,” he said. “So we say: ‘You have two balls. If that ball runs out, you’re done. You’re not going to get another one. So make the most out of this opportunity here and now.’ Then play for example, 10 v eight, in a tight space.
“The good thing with that is players really take care of the ball, but still know you have to take the risk at the right moment, because otherwise you’re just keeping the ball and you’re not scoring. So it’s about finding that right moment. They play the ball into Rosa in quite a tight space centrally and from that moment I think everyone is expecting her to pass the ball back, but we continue to go on the other side and she turns on a dime; you can see a whole ocean is opening up in that moment. I was straight away like: ‘Yes, that’s exactly it.’”
The move to Arsenal was a “pretty fast process”, says Kafaji. “I got a good feeling from the beginning, speaking to Jonas, and from there it was just a good choice.”
Asked whether she sought the advice of Arsenal’s Swedish trio Lina Hurtig, Stina Blackstenius and Amanda Ilestedt before the move, she says: “Actually, I didn’t. I was trying to be sneaky and speak to Stina sometimes. I was very low key with it and didn’t tell anyone until it was done.”
Her desire is to add creativity and an attacking threat. “I want to go forward all the time,” she says. The ultimate goal? “I would like to win a trophy with the team and try to play as many games as possible from the start. I want to build chemistry with my team and score some goals.”
