No joke as Edu wins long battle for self-fulfilment

Champions' League: Brazilian casts off the misfit label as Wenger confirms his mastery in talent-spotting stakes

If the best way to judge a manager's success in the transfer market is by studying the impact of his less high-profile signings, then Arsène Wenger is a far more astute shopper than Claudio Ranieri.

Whereas the Chelsea manager, who will be looking for his first-ever win against Arsenal in the first leg of the Champions' League quarter-final at Stamford Bridge on Wednesday night, could easily be the subject of a BBC series entitled Who Not To Buy, his Arsenal counterpart has continued to unearth raw talents.

Critics laughed in the summer of 2000 when Wenger spent £5m on an unknown Brazilian called Edu; and they laughed even more when the midfielder was turned away by customs officials at Heathrow after invalid papers had been supplied by an agent. But little did anyone know that Edu's life was far from amusing at the time. No sooner had he returned to Brazil while his new passport was being processed than his family were robbed at gunpoint at their home in Sao Paulo. Then he broke his foot.

Worse, though, was still to come, as his sister, Fabricia, was killed in a car crash. By the time he had limped off 17 minutes into his debut against Leicester City, Edu was at his lowest ebb.

"When I first came to Arsenal I had so many problems," he says, "everything inside my head was broken. I wanted to prove to the world that Arsène Wenger had been right to buy me, but I couldn't play because I didn't feel strong. Nobody understood my problems, though. Everybody just looked at me and thought, 'Five million pounds for Edu, eh? You must be joking'. That was not nice to hear."

Wenger, who has remained loyal to his player throughout, remarks that Edu is "only 25 but has lived the life of a 40-year-old". Edu, for his part, says he would never had stayed without Wenger's support. "I was lucky because he defended me passionately. Arsène Wenger always had kind words. He always said he believed in me."

No one would have been particularly surprised had Edu followed the route of a number of imports by quietly fading away and returning to Brazil. No chance. It is a credit to him that he has not only recaptured the sort of form that tempted Wenger to take a punt on him when he was a youngster at Corinthians, but has gone on to become a world-class talent.

"However difficult it was," explains Edu, who is expected to earn his first international call-up for Brazil's World Cup qualifier against Paraguay next month, "I was always driven to succeed. I did not come to England to be a failure."

Edu, whose full name is Eduardo Cesar Daud Gaspar, can now talk about the bad old days, even though he admits that "a day never passes when I don't think about my sister". He is happily settled in the London area with his Brazilian wife, Paula, and he recently became a father for the first time. "When I arrived in England," he recalls, "I felt like a stranger. Now I feel like I belong."

Such has been the turn-around in fortunes that Edu, and not his compatriot Gilberto Silva, is now the first-choice partner for Patrick Vieira in the centre of midfield. His club captain never had any doubts he would become a success. "Edu just needed a run in the side to prove how good he is," Vieira says. "He had a few injuries which did not help but he is settled now. The way he has played the last few weeks has been fantastic."

Edu blushes at the praise. "I just think that I have been lucky to play a few games," he says modestly, "and that's given me more confidence to express myself in midfield."

On Wednesday, when Arsenal travel to SW6 for what Wenger describes as "the first game in the most important two weeks of our season", Edu will be in his favoured position. "I enjoy playing against Chelsea," says Edu, who scored the winner when the two sides met in the FA Cup recently.

One wonders, though, whether Edu's promotion to a more central role has put Gilberto's World Cup-winning nose out of joint? "Of course everybody wants to play," Edu adds, "but I can tell you that I'm happy and that Gilberto is happy, too. We are so close that there could never be any nasty rivalry between us."

While Wenger insists that Gilberto has a future at Arsenal, he is nonetheless keen to heap special praise on Edu. "He always had the talent," the manager explains, "but also seemed to pick up another injury just when he was settling into the team. This season he is stronger, fitter and more suited to the English game. He has a good football brain and deserves his place in the side at the moment."

Hard as it is to believe now that Arsenal seem unbeatable, there were those (this foolish journalist included) who felt that Wenger's squad lacked the necessary depth to challenge on all fronts. "Back in September," the Frenchman recalls, "after we had lost 3-0 at home to Inter in the Champions' League and then drawn 0-0 at Old Trafford, many people felt our season might be over. They all said our squad was too small to win anything, but then players like Edu really emerged and made a huge difference. I would say Edu has been our revelation this season."