The transfer window is reopening in a matter of days, which can only mean one thing: Conor Gallagher’s future at Chelsea is once again a hot topic.
Earlier this week, The Athletic reported that Aston Villa have opened preliminary talks with Chelsea and Gallagher’s representatives over a possible summer transfer, with manager Unai Emery a huge admirer of the 24-year-old and keen to bolster his midfield options ahead of a Champions League campaign in 2024-25.
It may come as a surprise that Chelsea are open to selling the Cobham academy product, who frequently captained Mauricio Pochettino’s team on the pitch last season and led the entire first-team squad in minutes played across all competitions. But this is a complex situation with several factors at play and a number of different outcomes are still possible.
Here is a dive into some of the most important questions surrounding Gallagher’s future.
Why are Chelsea open to selling Gallagher?
There are two elements to this: Gallagher the player and Gallagher the asset.
One had the best season of his career at Chelsea last season, entrenched himself in the affections of match-going supporters, and consolidated his place in the England squad. The other has 12 months left to run on his contract and a growing list of suitors across the Premier League.
One reason Gallagher’s deal has run down to this point is that, for much of the last two years, Chelsea’s sporting leadership and ownership have not been convinced that he should be integral to their long-term midfield plans. It is why they were prepared to accept a £45million ($57.5m) offer from Everton in January 2023 and why West Ham and Tottenham were emboldened to express serious interest in signing him last summer.
It is also why Chelsea have spent north of £300million on midfielders in the past 18 months, headlined by the nine-figure transfer fees paid for Enzo Fernandez and Moises Caicedo.
Gallagher did everything he could to challenge that thinking with an excellent personal 2023-24 campaign, improving significantly in many areas of his game. But if Chelsea do not believe that progress merits a new contract on significantly improved terms, this summer is their last realistic opportunity to secure real value in a sale.
That value would need to be in excess of £50million for a Chelsea starter and England international who, at 24, still appears to be improving.
Gallagher captained Chelsea this season (Darren Walsh/Chelsea FC via Getty Images)
Do they need to sell Gallagher, or other home-grown players, to comply with financial rules?
Chelsea officials insist they expect the club to comply with the Premier League’s profit and sustainability rules (PSR) for 2023-24 without making further player sales before the accounting deadline of June 30, though there is considerable scepticism among many football finance analysts outside Stamford Bridge as to how they can hope to achieve that.
A controversial £76.5million deal to sell the two hotels outside Stamford Bridge to another subsidiary company of Chelsea’s ownership group was decisive in the club squeezing under the £105million allowable loss limit for PSR in 2022-23. It is still awaiting sign-off from the Premier League but does underline that Clearlake Capital and Todd Boehly are prepared to get creative to ensure future PSR compliance.
Chelsea’s qualification for next season’s Europa Conference League also means they are once again subject to UEFA’s club licensing and financial sustainability regulations (FSR), which only allow losses up to €80million (£68.5m; $86m) for the 2024-25 monitoring period. There is at least no such pressure to sell players by June 30 on this front, since UEFA’s monitoring period runs from January 1 to December 31.
Whatever the true extent of the PSR and FSR pressures, Chelsea know that selling players — and particularly cashing in on academy graduates, who count as pure profit on the books — is the only realistic route to creating the wiggle room for more significant recruitment this summer.
It does not necessarily need to be Gallagher who leaves Stamford Bridge. Chelsea are already guaranteed £28million through the sale of Lewis Hall to Newcastle, while the proceeds of Mason Mount’s £55million transfer to Manchester United last summer will go on this year’s accounts. They also banked between £11million and £14million from add-ons in clauses of loan and transfer deals this season.
They could generate £35million by selling Ian Maatsen, while Armando Broja and Trevoh Chalobah could raise more than £50million combined. While not a Cobham graduate, Omari Hutchinson could also command a sizeable fee after a highly successful loan spell at Ipswich Town.
Maatsen played in a Champions League final and is available for £35million (Marvin Ibo Guengoer – GES Sportfoto/Getty Images)
How does all of this affect Gallagher’s thinking about his future?
Gallagher is in an extremely strong position. His stock has never been higher and he can expect a large pay rise in his next contract, whether at Chelsea or elsewhere.
He is a well-documented Chelsea fan and his preference remains what it has always been: to pursue a long and successful career at his boyhood club. He has never agitated to leave and he cannot be sold against his wishes. One of the few things he cannot control is whether he is offered a new contract that reflects his own sense of value to the team and to the club.
But if Aston Villa or another interested club present an offer that satisfies Chelsea, Gallagher will have a real decision to make. Will he play as often, or as well, for incoming head coach Enzo Maresca as he did for Pochettino in what is likely to be a different tactical system? There is no guarantee that next season will be as individually rewarding as 2023-24 proved to be.
Within that context, going into the final year of his current contract at Stamford Bridge would be a big risk for Gallagher to take — and he would do so with no assurance that a new contract offer from Chelsea would be forthcoming before he hits free agency in the summer of 2025. As with any player, ultimately he needs to do what he feels is best for his career.
Transfer speculation also presents an unwelcome distraction as Gallagher seeks to fully focus on helping England at Euro 2024, though he has so far done an admirable job of not allowing uncertainty over his future to affect his performances in a Chelsea shirt.
Gallagher is preparing for Euro 2024 (Marc Atkins/Getty Images)
Would Chelsea consider selling him to Tottenham?
For much of the Roman Abramovich era, it seemed inconceivable that any high-profile player could move between Chelsea and Tottenham in either direction. The mutual rivalry and animosity went well beyond the stands, reaching all the way into the boardrooms of both clubs.
Clearlake and Boehly are far more business-minded. Tottenham held serious talks with Chelsea about signing Gallagher last summer, but an unbridgeable gap in the two clubs’ valuations meant things went no further. It is likely that any offer that meets the midfielder’s asking price will be considered on its merits rather than rejected out of hand due to the identity of the bidder.
The more intriguing variable is how Gallagher would view the possibility of joining Spurs. Many supporters will be hoping he is not put in that position.
Is a new contract at Chelsea still a possibility?
Absolutely. This is not a Mount situation, where bitterness and acrimony took hold on all sides and a parting began to feel inevitable months before it finally happened.
Chelsea’s co-sporting directors Laurence Stewart and Paul Winstanley have maintained a dialogue with Gallagher’s representatives throughout the last 18 months and there is no sense of bad blood. His unerring professionalism is greatly appreciated and he is a popular figure around Cobham as well as Stamford Bridge.
If he is sold this summer, it will not be cheaply, and if offers do not materialise at the level Chelsea would like, it would not be a shock if talks over a new contract began to gather pace.
As has become the norm for Gallagher over the past 18 months, nothing about his future is set in stone.
(Top photo: Ryan Pierse/Getty Images)
