Conor Gallagher will likely start for Chelsea tonight after establishing himself as a Frank Lampard favourite.
The midfielder’s first season as a senior Chelsea player has been a firestorm at times, but he certainly hasn’t lost faith in his teammates, who he insists are all great guys caught in a bad situation.
“It’s just hasn’t gone our way and we haven’t been good enough. Teams have seasons like that and this season was ours for sure. We’ve stayed positive and it’s still a good place to come to work every day,” Gallagher said in an interview on the BBC.
“It’s a process, there’s a lot of new players. A lot of the boys can say we learnt a lot this season and developed mentally more than anything. But obviously no one has been happy at all, no one wants to lose games.
“It’s a good atmosphere [inside the dressing room] considering it’s been a tough season. They’re such great lads, everyone is very humble. If we’re winning games, it’ll be the best group of lads in the world.”
Mature words from an increasingly mature player. Transfermarkt value him at €32m, but we would expect him to be get significantly more than that on the open market, now he’s increasingly a first team regular at Chelsea.
It’s not been easy, breaking into the team in a season of total catastrophe, but Gallagher has started to emerge as a real winner from the chaos.
It still seems our board’s plan is to sell academy players like Conor in order to afford the excesses of last year, and Gallagher would earn a big fee – but we would have to spend just as much to replace him, so it’s not a smart move.
