Arsenal loanee named in Europa League Teams of the Week

Jakub Kiwior has helped FC Porto with three consecutive clean sheets on its loan fate so far, winning the last with an authorization outside the line.

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Arsenal defender Jakub Kiwior took an excellent start to the loan with FC Porto, the Portuguese club keeping clean leaves in each of its first three appearances for the team.

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Thursday’s match at RB Salzburg was perhaps the best individual display in International Poland so far, with Flashscore and Sofascore appointing him to their teams of the Europa League.

Kiwior obtained its place with four authorizations (including an offline), four blocked shots, two interceptions, two plated and 93% of finished passes. He won all his individual duels in a dominant defensive performance.

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Despite Porto’s defensive solidity, the match remained tense until the end, the outside side opening the scoring in the 93rd minute. Kiwior later admitted that it was not an easy victory.

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“It was a great evening because we won, but it was a difficult match,” said Kiwior. “But we are happy because we have won.

“(The result) gives us a lot of energy to believe in every match and that we can win like that, because we have played as a team. We believed and won at the last minute.

“Today was a big victory for us and we have to change certain things in our game to earn more.”

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Porto will be very satisfied with their loan signature so far, waiting for Kiwior to make his move permanent at the end of the season.

Although Porto technically has a purchase option, rather than an obligation, Arsenal also has the capacity to activate the option. The two clubs have made such an agreement so that neither is able to retreat unless the other party accepted it.

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If Kiwior continues to play well, the wait will be that Porto has no qualms about activating the option. If things go south, it is always likely that Arsenal would activate it and the transfer will take place anyway.

David Ornstein reported at the time of the initial loan transfer that the total agreement was worth a guarantee of 25 million euros to 27 million euros.