Chelsea manager Liam Rosenior moved to reassure the club\u2019s supporters and the player himself after Enzo Fern\u00e1ndez was left out in the build-up to the FA Cup tie with Port Vale. The midfielder watched the 7\u20130 defeat from the sidelines, and Rosenior insisted his working relationship with Fern\u00e1ndez remains intact.<\/p>\n
\u201cI made it really clear yesterday what I think of him as a person. He\u2019s a top, top guy,\u201d Rosenior said, adding: \u201cIn the right time, in the right moment\u2014which isn\u2019t now, going through what we\u2019ve gone through\u2014I\u2019m sure the discussion will happen in terms of what\u2019s been said between me and Enzo. Enzo and I are in a very good place. I saw him today, had a really good conversation with him today one-to-one, and things aren\u2019t what people maybe think they are.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rosenior was at pains to stress he was not the driving force behind what the club described as a \u201cjoint decision\u201d to sideline Fern\u00e1ndez. The manager underlined that Fern\u00e1ndez came to watch and spoke with him directly before the match.<\/p>\n
The player\u2019s agent, former Argentina international Javier Pastore, publicly defended Fern\u00e1ndez after the suspension was announced. Pastore said he received \u201cno real reason or justification\u201d for a punishment he called \u201cfar too harsh.\u201d Pastore pointed to Fern\u00e1ndez\u2019s comments about living in Spain, quoting the midfielder: “I\u2019d like to live in Spain, I really like Madrid; it reminds me of Buenos Aires. Players live where they want. I\u2019d live in Madrid. I get by in English, but I\u2019d be more comfortable in Spanish.” Pastore added: \u201cHe only mentions Madrid, the city, because he was asked which European city he\u2019d like to live in one day, and he said Madrid because of the language, because it\u2019s similar to Buenos Aires and because it\u2019s logical\u2014it\u2019s only natural for an Argentine to say that\u2014and also because of the culture, the weather … but at no point does he say he wants to leave Chelsea or London.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fern\u00e1ndez has also left the door open to a potential summer transfer when asked about Real Madrid in other interviews.<\/p>\n
Responding to Pastore, Rosenior said: \u201cThat\u2019s his opinion. I don\u2019t have anything to say on someone else\u2019s opinion. Enzo knows what I think of him and it was brilliant to see him here to support the players today.\u201d<\/p>\n
By omitting Fern\u00e1ndez, Rosenior lost the squad\u2019s second-top scorer, leading assist provider and vice captain. With first-choice skipper Reece James out injured, Rosenior appointed Cole Palmer as captain for the match and praised him: \u201cI think it\u2019s a natural step for Cole where he is in his career. He shows leadership. You have different types of leadership. You have players who talk, who organize.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat Cole does and where he leads is he\u2019s so brave and he\u2019ll take the ball on the pitch. And if he makes a mistake, he\u2019ll take the ball and be positive again. That reflects what I want in this team. I felt Cole led the team magnificently in the game today.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Rosenior insists his relationship with Enzo Fern\u00e1ndez is strong despite the suspension at Port Vale.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10838,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[190,172],"tags":[983,1304,1006],"class_list":["post-10839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-chelsea","category-epl","tag-agents","tag-benching","tag-captaincy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10839"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10839\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10838"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}