Former Super Eagles midfielder Mikel Obi has praised Chelsea manager Enzo Maresca’s perfect handling of Enzo Fernandez’s racism controversy.
Recall that Maresca defended Enzo following his involvement in posting a clip of his teammates singing offensive chants about French players.
The incident occurred during Fernandez’s celebration of Argentina’s Copa América victory, where the song in question contained racist and homophobic remarks about the heritage of some French players.
The former Leicester manager, who was appointed to replace Mauricio Pochettino in June, said that he hoped all involved moved on from the incident.
Reacting to the development, the former Chelsea star, in a chat, noted that he was impressed with the way Maresca handled the situation.
“The only way he can settle this is by making sure the team starts winning. If you start winning, it changes everything because the celebration, the hugs.If Enzo comes back, first game and score a goal. You will see those players going to hug him. They have to go and hug him, they have to go and celebrate with him.
“Slowly and surely, that brings the team together. The thing is that time is a healer but Chelsea needs to start winning. They need to have a good start to the season if that needs to go away. If they don’t and it lingers and it breeds negativity around the whole place and we don’t want that. We have a bad season. We need to start well, we need to start winning.
“Enzo needs to find a way to deal with that and for me poor guy, what a way to start your Chelsea career and this is a massive thing.You have about nine, 10 players who unfollowed one of your stars and a player we think you need to get the best out of because if you get the best out of this guy.
“He is a fantastic footballer, him and Caicedo in that middle, we will dominate any team I promise you in the Premier League but probably not Manchester City.”
Olaitan Ibrahim