England midfielder Conor Gallagher has completed a protracted move from Chelsea to Atletico Madrid, bringing down the curtain on a 16-year association with the Blues and the latest shabby episode at the west London club.
Gallagher joined Chelsea’s academy as an eight-year-old and is something of a Blues hero, a local lad done good and one of their own to match-going supporters.
He regularly captained the side under former head coach Mauricio Pochettino last season, and was comfortably one of the most consistent players in another chaotic campaign.
It has, however, been an open secret for some time that Chelsea’s owners view Gallagher less as a homegrown hero to build around, and more as a sellable asset. As an academy graduate, you see, Gallagher will count as “pure profit” on the balance sheet in the club’s next accounts.
His £36million move to Spain will enable Chelsea to swell an already-bloated squad with further signings (Atletico’s Joao Felix is coming the other way in a £44.5million deal), whose transfer fees can be amortised over the first five years of their contracts.
Chelsea believe Gallagher rejected three good contract offers, the latest of which in July would have put him on par with their top earners, though he was apparently told he would not be first-choice under new head coach Enzo Maresca, which may be an indicator of why he was reluctant to sign.
But Gallagher and his advisers can hardly have failed to pick up on the prevailing sense that Chelsea’s hierarchy would prefer to cash-in on him, even when he was a key player under Pochettino. After all, the club’s unprecedented business model under Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital relies on these sales.
Gallagher has been forced to train alone in recent weeks while his messy exit was finalised, which is not unusual in elite football but a poor way, really, to treat a player who has been with the club since before he was in long trousers and has consistently spoken about his love and support for the Blues.
Trevoh Chalobah, another player who has been at Chelsea since he was eight and did well under Pochettino, is in the same position, currently training alone as the club search for a buyer.
There is rarely room for sentimentality in the dog-eat-dog world of the Premier League, which is one of this country's truest meritocracies, and if Chelsea believe Gallagher, Chalobah and others do not make the grade, they are entitled to move them on.
The club can point to captain Reece James and Levi Colwill, key members of the squad, as proof that truly elite academy graduates remain treasured.
There is, though, something grubby about the way Chelsea have treated the likes of Gallagher, and it is hard not to conclude that he has been forced out of his club, regarded as little more than a number on the balance-sheet by owners who have little feel for the importance of concepts such as identity and community.
In Chelsea’s defence, the fate of Gallagher can be explained in part by the Premier League’s profit and sustainability rules, which perversely incentivise clubs to sell homegrown players.
There is, though, something specific to Chelsea’s ownership in Gallagher’s treatment, which feels like the consequence of a club which have made these deals a cornerstone of a unique strategy.
Modern Chelsea exist in a permanent state of flux, with more than 40 senior players currently on the books, engaged in what increasingly feels like a real-life version of the computer game Football Manager. They have spent well over £1billion on a revolving door of new signings, funded largely by selling the only players who have a genuine understanding of what it really means and takes to play for the club.
Most match-going supporters recognise this, and during the home derby with Tottenham in May, Chelsea fans unveiled a huge banner embossed with Gallagher’s image and the caption “Chelsea Since Birth”, while a minority chanted his name during the start of the new season against Manchester City on Sunday.
As another link between club and supporters departs, the divide between match-going fans and Chelsea’s ownership is only deepening.
