After all the distractions and turmoil before Arsenal stepped on board their plane to Los Angeles it was only reasonable to expect a gloomy atmosphere to have enveloped the Gunners.
Yet there seems to have been a string in Arsenal's step in the early days of this gruelling two week, bi-coastal trip around the United States. It may be too much to credit all of that to one man but the immediate impact Edu has had on the club cannot be overstated.
Simply put, his delight to be back at Arsenal 14 years after he left has proven to be infectious.
Senior figures at the club rave about the new technical director and were taken aback by the enthusiasm of a man who travelled from Rio De Janeiro to London via the briefest of stops in Sao Paulo just so he could be on board the team plane that took off to the States. As they pointed out to him at the time, it would not have been a problem if he had simply met them in California.
Of course the rancour of Laurent Koscielny's refusal to fly has not been forgotten but there is a determination among the travelling party not to let that issue hang like a cloud over this sun-kissed tour.
Arsenal had waited a long time to get Edu into the club - even before they moved for Monchi earlier this year they had been thinking about how they could involve the Invicibles midfielder - and he is already proving to be worth it.
Meanwhile the players themselves are hard at work, being put through Unai Emery's gruelling double sessions. Reiss Nelson's remarkably quick feet and stunning goal certainly lit up the facilities at Loyola Marymont University and reflected the excitement that the young players in this squad have brought to Arsenal.
And there are certainly plenty of them. At a crossover event with the Los Angeles Rams on Saturday afternoon first-team players Bernd Leno and Nacho Monreal were joined by a cavalcade of youngsters eager to show off their skill with a football extends to the American game.
It shows how quickly soccer has grown in America that these players were mobbed by dozens of admiring youngsters as they made their way out onto the football field to take part in the fun and games. But still the Gunners can't quite compete with their American football counterparts.
For while the great Gunnersaurus got some warm applause from a rather confused group of children as he made his way out onto the pitch he was immediately outshone by the adulation that greeted Rampage, the Los Angeles Rams mascot.
