Mudryk Returns to Chelsea as a Relentless Worker
Mykhailo Mudryk needed only a few minutes in Hong Kong to remind Chelsea what they have been missing. Not with a goal, not with a dazzling run, but simply by being back out there at all.
Twenty months away from the team. A stop-start Chelsea career effectively frozen while anti-doping disciplinary proceedings rumbled on in the background. Then, on Wednesday night at the Kai Tak Stadium, the lights came back on.
He entered late in a 1-0 defeat to Juventus, but the scoreline barely mattered when the fourth official’s board went up. More than 43,000 inside Kai Tak roared as Mudryk jogged onto the pitch, his first appearance for the club since November 2024. Relief, curiosity, a touch of defiance – it all poured down from the stands.
For Tosin Adarabioyo, there was no sense of shock at how ready Mudryk looked.
“Misha is my guy,” the centre-back said afterwards. “I have kept in contact with him throughout and it is really nice to have him back. I am really happy for him.”
Xabi Alonso had told Mudryk before kick-off that he would get the final 10 to 15 minutes. The script was agreed early. Every Chelsea player on the pitch at the time would eventually be replaced in the second half, but one decision stood out: Nicolas Jackson had already agreed to sacrifice his own minutes to make sure Mudryk could step in.
When the moment came, the Ukrainian did not look like someone who had spent almost two years away from the squad environment. He has only had a handful of sessions since rejoining training, yet he moved with the sharpness of a player who never really switched off.
That, Tosin insisted, is exactly who Mudryk is.
“You can see he is just really happy to be around and back in the environment,” he said. “It is obviously going to take him some time but we are all here to support him.”
Then came the line that will follow Mudryk around Cobham for a while.
“Misha is a freak. His work rate is unbelievable,” Tosin said, only half-smiling. “There is no doubt he has been working hard throughout this whole time. I know he has been doing sessions away, I have seen him. I know the guys he has been working with so it's good.”
Asked whether Mudryk’s fitness surprised him after such a long absence, Tosin barely paused.
“No, not at all,” he replied. “Like I just said I know Misha really well, his work rate is phenomenal, so I am not surprised at all.”
For a player whose Chelsea story has often been told in the language of expectation and frustration, this was a different kind of endorsement. Not the usual talk of potential or price tags, but of graft. Of a winger who, even while suspended from the spotlight, refused to let his body fall behind his ambition.
Around him, the shape of this Chelsea dressing room is shifting too, and Tosin’s own role is changing with it.
The defender is known around the club as “Uncle Tosin”, a playful nod to his status as one of the older heads in a famously youthful squad. At just 28, he had somehow become the de facto elder. Not anymore.
Danny Welbeck, 35, and Jordan Henderson, 36, have arrived this summer, tilting the age profile and bringing with them years of Premier League and international experience.
“No, thank God,” Tosin laughed, when reminded he is no longer the “uncle”. “We have Welbeck now. I have known him for a long time just growing up in Manchester.”
Welbeck’s unofficial Chelsea debut came in the same Hong Kong friendly, the striker starting and playing the opening 45 minutes before making way. It was a low-key beginning, but Tosin is in no doubt about what his fellow Mancunian can offer.
“We have all seen that he scores goals,” he said. “He is a striker and he is here to help. The way that he can help is by scoring goals and I am sure he will do that.”
Henderson, too, drew a nod of respect from the defender.
“Pure experience and at the same time, they are winners,” Tosin said of the new arrivals. “They will bring that winning mentality to the club and hopefully we will continue that way.”
So Chelsea leave Hong Kong with a defeat to Juventus on the board, but that will not be what lingers. Instead, they fly back with a winger labelled a “freak” for all the right reasons, a forward line bolstered by Welbeck’s know-how, and a midfield about to feel Henderson’s voice.
Mudryk’s cameo was brief. His road back will be longer and far more demanding. Yet if the work he has done in the shadows matches the faith of those inside the dressing room, this may be the point where his Chelsea career finally starts to run at full speed.
