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Tottenham are finally starting to move into action in the January transfer window to sign a midfielder they have wanted for a long time
Tottenham are set to see off competition from Aston Villa to sign Conor Gallagher and it is a transfer that has been a while in the making.
Ange Postecoglou privately called for the signing of the England international last summer but Tottenham were not able to get near a deal with Chelsea at that point. The midfielder would instead make the move to Atletico Madrid and now 18 months on, Spurs have come back in to sign the 25-year-old in a £34.7million deal that is being finalised at Hotspur Way on Tuesday as Gallagher goes through his medical and the formalities of his move at a training ground he knows well from his international experience.
Postecoglou saw Gallagher as the perfect number eight in his system and the former Chelsea man will bring plenty of quality and drive to Thomas Frank's midfield and fill the gap left by Rodrigo Bentancur's three-month absence with a different profile of player.
Here are five reasons why Tottenham have made the move for Gallagher to boost their starting XI.
Experienced leader
He might only be 25 but Gallagher has experienced a lot. He has played for three different Premier League clubs and taken on the challenge of La Liga football, while also playing 23 Champions League matches and 22 games for England. He's played for his country at a European Championship and been in the squad for a World Cup. He also played in the Championship as a youngster to fully round out his development.
On top of that, he's a leader which is something this Spurs squad is lacking in the centre of the park and his mentality has always been praised by those he has worked with.
Former Chelsea keeper Petr Cech said of Gallagher in 2024: "He's always been working hard. He's one of the players that's always cared about winning and about the club. You find that even young players can have special abilities to be a leader. Conor is one of those players - he's always worked hard, he's always cared and he always tries his best.
"He's pushing and he is one of the captains in the making, because of the way he is."
There is another Tottenham connection in Mauricio Pochettino, who managed Gallagher at Chelsea and frequently made him skipper in the absence of the injured Reece James.
While the Blues wanted to sell Gallagher because of his profitability as an academy product within the financial fair play rules, the Argentine would fight to keep him.
"He is a player with a great commitment to the team. He is always trying to compensate in every situation, in offensive and defensive situations. It's priceless to have a player like him," said the former Spurs boss.
"‘He is in the starting XI nearly every game and one of the captains. For me, he is the type of player that the club need to have.
"He runs, he plays, he fights. He does everything to win. He is a really important player that the coaching staff want to have on the team."
There's a reason that Unai Emery wanted to bring Gallagher to high-flying Villa and now Tottenham will have him in their ranks instead.
Chances created
Gallagher will step in to fill the hole left by Bentancur's three-month absence but he will bring a different profile to the Tottenham midfield.
If people are expecting a bog-standard sitting midfielder then they will be surprised by the England international. He is comfortable at both ends of the pitch and is an all rounder with ferocious energy levels to press and win the ball back high up the pitch, while creating openings for others.
In the 2023/24 season, Gallagher created 53 chances for his Chelsea team-mates, the tenth highest number on the Premier League list of midfielders that season with most above him being more attacking midfielders.
In a system like Frank's which relies on high, aggressive pressing to turn over the ball in key areas, Gallagher should revel in the midfield.
He has 68 goal involvements in 289 senior games which is more than reasonable for a player in his position. To put that into context with Spurs' other senior midfielders, Bentancur has 44 goal involvements in 388 matches and Joao Palhinha has 35 in 373 games. The out of favour Yves Bissouma has 17 goal involvements in 279 games.
Between them, the younger trio of Pape Matar Sarr, Archie Gray and Lucas Bergvall have 58 goal involvements in total but almost half of those come from the latter's time in Sweden's different levels and cup.
So the role he will be playing in, Gallagher will be step up in terms of goal creation and scoring while not being expected to be the main playmaker as someone like Xavi Simons and eventually Dejan Kulusevski and later James Maddison will be.
Homegrown
It's not that important to the outside world but Tottenham needed to start replenishing their homegrown numbers in their Premier League squad.
We know all about the Champions League squad issues and the lack of club-trained players and falling number of association-trained players, which you can find the latest on by clicking right here, but you also need to have a minimum of eight homegrown players in your Premier League squad.
Spurs currently have six of those with the departure of Brennan Johnson - albeit they have others on the under-21s list - but they could lose Ben Davies in the summer at the end of his contract and bringing in a new senior homegrown player in Gallagher can only be a good thing in that respect.
There's also a certain sense of pride at the club to have England players in their ranks and Gallagher will be hoping that he can force himself into Thomas Tuchel's thoughts just in time for the World Cup, as will Dominic Solanke, while Djed Spence will be looking to keep his spot in the German's squad.
Few injuries
Yes we know this is Tottenham so the fates will decide that Gallagher will probably end up broken within minutes of stepping through the doors of Hotspur Way, but the 25-year-old does have a ridiculously good injury record.
In fact if you look on Transfermarkt at the former Chelsea man's injury stats it does not have a single injury recorded in his entire senior career. The only recorded absence is through illness from which he missed five days back in March 2024.
For a club that has so many injury problems every season, at least getting someone who has no history of them beforehand should bode well. But yes we know that's happened before at Tottenham. Poor Solanke for example had only missed three matches at Bournemouth since early 2021 before stepping through the doors at Spurs and injured his ankle within a couple of weeks.
We're trying to stay positive here though and hope that Gallagher follows instead in the footsteps of Pedro Porro, who has only so far missed two matches since arriving at Tottenham three years ago.
Future and now
Gallagher ticks the exact description that Frank spoke about when he said the club needed to sign players for the now and long-term.
"I can see this is not a quick fix, unfortunately. This is a longer journey. That doesn't mean that in the longer journey that we don't need to win football matches, we have to, and hopefully a lot of them, and perform well and all that. But to get to where we want to get, it just takes time to build that," he said.
On transfers specifically the Dane said this month: "We are out there. We are really alert. The club really want to see what we can do to strengthen the squad and the team. I say many times it's a difficult window, and we still need the short-term solution to be the long-term solution as well."
Gallagher fits that mould as the midfielder arrives with plenty of experience at every level and will quickly become a leading voice in the dressing room and on the pitch, one who also sets the tempo of the team's play.
However, in turning 26 next month, he has not yet reached his peak and could feasibly have a long career ahead at Tottenham if all works out as expected.
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