Wesley Sneijder was on the Dutch coverage of Chelsea’s 2-0 loss to Real Madrid last night, and he picked out Enzo Fernandez for criticism after watching the Argentine walking around the pitch after losing the ball rather than racing to win possession.
“If you have been brought in as a player for €100million then you can at least expect that he will run his lungs out, right?,” the former Madrid man said in quotes picked up by the Metro.
“But he walked! He loses the ball himself, then he has a moment of mourning. You see Enzo, a €100m purchase, trudge a bit while Gallagher runs past him.
“You look at a boy like that and I wonder: what does he take ownership of? He doesn’t. I don’t think he’s a great footballer either. You [the show’s presenter] said he did it for Lionel Messi [at the World Cup]. I thought he would do it at Chelsea too, but he doesn’t.
“If things don’t go smoothly in football, and you’re not scoring goals, then you have to make sure you don’t concede. You have to run your lungs out, and he won’t do that.”
It’s a scathing criticism, not just of his work rate but also of his ability. We certainly will want to see more of both. We haven’t seen too many Chelsea fans get too critical of Enzo just yet, perhaps because he’s largely been playing well despite the chaos around him.
But a few more bad results and a few more petulant moments like this and he will be surprised how quickly opinions can change, even when it comes to a superstar €100m signing like him.
