diff --git a/compose.yaml b/compose.yaml
index a2f0d224..400e2ad1 100644
--- a/compose.yaml
+++ b/compose.yaml
@@ -36,6 +36,8 @@ services:
     environment:
       - ANSIBLE_DISPLAY_SKIPPED_HOSTS=${ANSIBLE_DISPLAY_SKIPPED_HOSTS:-false}
       - ANSIBLE_INVENTORY=inventories/partition.yaml,clab-mini-lab/ansible-inventory.yml
+      - KUBECONFIG=/mini-lab/.kubeconfig
+      - K8S_AUTH_KUBECONFIG=/mini-lab/.kubeconfig
       - CI=${CI}
       - DOCKER_HUB_USER=${DOCKER_HUB_USER}
       - DOCKER_HUB_TOKEN=${DOCKER_HUB_TOKEN}
diff --git a/deploy_partition.yaml b/deploy_partition.yaml
index 705d707a..a3ee4b01 100644
--- a/deploy_partition.yaml
+++ b/deploy_partition.yaml
@@ -91,6 +91,25 @@
         pull: true
       failed_when: false
 
+- name: Install python client and generate deployment token
+  hosts: localhost
+  connection: local
+  gather_facts: false
+  pre_tasks:
+    - name: Wait until the metal-apiserver is running
+      kubernetes.core.k8s_info:
+        kind: Deployment
+        name: metal-apiserver
+        namespace: "{{ metal_control_plane_namespace }}"
+        wait: true
+        wait_sleep: 1
+        wait_timeout: 600
+  roles:
+    - name: ansible-common
+      tags: always
+    - name: metal-roles/common/roles/metal-v2-client
+    - name: metal-roles/common/roles/metal-deployment-token
+
 - name: Deploy pixiecore on leaf01
   hosts: leaf01
   become: true
@@ -99,6 +118,8 @@
       tags: always
     - name: metal-roles/partition/roles/pixiecore
       tags: pixiecore
+    - name: metal-roles/partition/roles/image-cache
+      tags: image-cache
 
 - name: Deploy monitoring on leaf01
   hosts: leaf01
diff --git a/inventories/control-plane.yaml b/inventories/control-plane.yaml
index e8413def..13ab9076 100644
--- a/inventories/control-plane.yaml
+++ b/inventories/control-plane.yaml
@@ -3,3 +3,4 @@ control_plane:
   hosts:
     localhost:
       ansible_python_interpreter: "{{ ansible_playbook_python }}"
+      ansible_connection: local
diff --git a/inventories/group_vars/all/release_vector.yaml b/inventories/group_vars/all/release_vector.yaml
index f801fffc..7aee7e4c 100644
--- a/inventories/group_vars/all/release_vector.yaml
+++ b/inventories/group_vars/all/release_vector.yaml
@@ -33,12 +33,15 @@ metal_stack_release_vectors:
 # ...
 #
 
+image_cache_sync_image_tag: migrate-to-metal-apiserver
+image_cache_sync_image_name: ghcr.io/metal-stack/metal-image-cache-sync
+
 ##
 ## for ansible roles
 ##
 
 # ansible_common_version:
-# metal_roles_version:
+metal_roles_version: migrate-metal-image-cache-sync-to-metal-apiserver
 # metal_ansible_modules_version:
 
 ##
diff --git a/inventories/group_vars/partition/image_cache.yaml b/inventories/group_vars/partition/image_cache.yaml
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..71709675
--- /dev/null
+++ b/inventories/group_vars/partition/image_cache.yaml
@@ -0,0 +1,6 @@
+---
+image_cache_sync_metal_apiserver_url: "http://v2.api.172.17.0.1.nip.io:8080"
+image_cache_sync_excludes:
+  - "/pull_requests/"
+  - "/stable/"
+image_cache_sync_expiration_grace_period: 100
diff --git a/inventories/partition.yaml b/inventories/partition.yaml
index fb3aa8a3..c94ed694 100644
--- a/inventories/partition.yaml
+++ b/inventories/partition.yaml
@@ -6,6 +6,7 @@ partition:
   hosts:
     localhost:
       ansible_python_interpreter: "{{ ansible_playbook_python }}"
+      ansible_connection: local
   children:
     dell_sonic:
     leaves: