Conor Gallagher: ‘I’ve got to believe I can improve this Chelsea team’

It was only a few weeks after Conor Gallagher had bumped into Thomas Tuchel while out with his family in a Cobham pub, but this time he knew exactly what he wanted to say to the Chelsea manager.

“I was trying to hide,” chuckles Gallagher at the memory of their first, accidental meeting. “It was funny because I saw him through the window and whispered to my girlfriend, mum and dad: ‘God, it’s Thomas Tuchel.’ He walked in and sat on the table right next to us so he couldn’t miss me.”

Tuchel later revealed he had apologised to Gallagher for ruling him out of Crystal Palace’s FA Cup semi-final against Chelsea under the terms of his loan, although it was the 22-year-old who took charge of the conversation when they spoke again on the phone at the end of the season.

“I said to him: ‘I think I’m ready to play for Chelsea,’” Gallagher recalls. “I said: ‘You know that’s what I want to do.’ I’ve got some older brothers that have told me if you’ve got something you want to say or ask then just ask because managers aren’t scary. They want to talk to their players and they want to know what your thoughts are. I told him what I thought and he said what he thought and I think that was the best way to do it.”

That Gallagher possesses such self-confidence will not come as a surprise to anyone who saw him play for Crystal Palace last season. Eight goals in 39 energetic appearances for Patrick Vieira’s side earned him a first England cap against San Marino last November and convinced Chelsea to finally place their trust in a player who joined their academy as an eight-year-old but is yet to make a first-team appearance.

Gallagher acknowledges he will face a fight to establish himself in Tuchel’s midfield after three successive seasons on