Chelsea launch investigation into Enzo Fernandez Argentina chant

Chelsea have launched an investigation after Enzo Fernandez posted a video of Argentina’s players appearing to sing a ‘racist and discriminatory’ chant. football.london understands that the Stamford Bridge club are looking into the incident after the footage surfaced online.

During the celebrations of Argentina’s Copa America win over Colombia, footage from Enzo Fernandez’s live Instagram broadcast captured the squad changing the first part of a controversial song. “On passport, French nationality, listen, spread the word, they play in France, but they are all…” before the recording is abruptly stopped with someone instructing to “cut the video”.

The rest of the chant, which was not recorded, allegedly includes offensive lines: “Listen, spread the word, they play in France, but they are all from Angola, they are going to run well, they like to sleep with trans people, their mum is Nigerian, their dad is Cameroonian, but on the passport it says: French.”

The leaked video has sparked outrage within the French Football Federation, prompting president, Philippe Diallo, demanding a response from both FIFA and the Argentinian Football Association regarding the conduct.

He said: “The president of the French Football Federation, Philippe Diallo, condemns in the strongest terms the unacceptable racist and discriminatory remarks which were made against the players of the French team in the context of a song sung by players and supporters of the Argentina team after its victory in the Copa America and broadcast in a video on social media,” a statement read.

“Faced with the seriousness of these shocking remarks, contrary to the values of sport and human rights, the president of the FFF decided to directly challenge his Argentine counterpart and FIFA and to file a legal complaint for insulting remarks of a racial and discriminatory nature.”

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On Tuesday night, Chelsea defender Wesley Fofana broke his silence on the video on X and Instagram. Alongside the screen recording of the video, he wrote: “Football in 2024: uninhibited racism.”

French Sports Minister Amelie Oudea-Castera also called for world football’s governing body FIFA to take action. Taking to X, formerly Twitter, she wrote: “Pathetic. Behaviour all the more unacceptable because it is repeated. FIFA: a reaction?”

SOS Racisme, an anti-racism group, has labelled the chants suggesting some France national team members are not truly French as “expression of a far-right ideology”.

“We condemn these intolerable comments in the strongest possible terms,” a statement read. “Racism has absolutely no place in sport, or in any other sphere of society. We demand that strict measures be taken against this deplorable behaviour.”