Enzo Maresca defended his decision to give Enzo Fernandez the captain’s armband for Chelsea’s 2-0 defeat against Manchester City on Sunday.
Fernandez led out Chelsea for their Premier League opener at Stamford Bridge in the absence of suspended club captain Reece James a little more than a month after the midfielder posted an Instagram video of he and several of his Argentina teammates singing a racist song about members of the France national team as they celebrated their 2024 Copa America triumph.
Chelsea defender Wesley Fofana branded the song “uninhibited racism” in a since deleted post on X and a number of Fernandez’s teammates at Stamford Bridge unfollowed him on social media in the wake of the incident. He subsequently apologised and offered to donate money to an anti-discrimination charity in an attempt to make amends.
Maresca does not believe the summer’s events have damaged Fernandez’s standing in the Chelsea dressing room and still considers the 23-year-old one of the leaders of his group.
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“I think Enzo is one of the captains of this team,” Maresca said of Fernandez. “He’s not the only one. We have Reece, we have some more captains there. The reason why (he was captain) is I can see that his teammates, they recognise him as a reference, like a captain. He was already captain in preseason when we changed with Reece during the game.
“All of us make mistakes. It’s important to recognise it. Enzo made a mistake, he recognised the mistake and it’s finished. It’s nothing important.”
Asked what kind of message it sends out to make Fernandez captain so soon after the incident, Maresca replied: “I don’t know about you, but I did mistakes in the past and I recognised (them).
“I think as a human being if you make a mistake and you recognise it, you are not going to be punished your whole life. Enzo did a mistake, he recognised it.
“For me he’s one of the references (for the team) and there’s nothing to add.”
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(Catherine Ivill – AMA/Getty Images)