On Monday, Chelsea expressed displeasure over Manchester City taking Enzo Maresca. The manager’s perspective about the matter has now emerged from Italy.
The Citizens announcing the 46-year-old’s arrival has been on the cards for weeks. The deal was done and only pending a formal announcement. In fact, Maresca had always been keen on joining Manchester City, even if clubs in Italy had enquired about him.
His exit from Chelsea wasn’t easy. Maresca asked to leave, knowing he was a candidate to take over from Pep Guardiola.
Journalist Gianluca Di Marzio has now expressed belief that the Blues are making something out of nothing.
Blues distorting facts
The Italian spoke to the Tuttomercatoweb podcast and Chelsea’s press release about Maresca was a major point of discussion.
Di Marzio claims the London club want to swing public opinion in their favour, through their stance. He dismissed all of it as a PR strategy, especially as they’ve been paid compensation.
He said – via TuttoNapoli: “I smiled a little bitterly at the reconstructions Chelsea have made. They have imposed, if you will, a version of the story that you will all have clearly understood did not happen that way.
“City had to pay a whopping €20m to release Maresca and make him manager of Manchester City. Chelsea have insisted on a reconstruction of the story, making it seem that Maresca caused damage to t he club. That he was only thinking about Manchester City, that by resigning he created problems for the club, and all these various reconstructions which, I repeat, tell a distorted truth.”
Ripping into Chelsea further, Di Marzio criticised how they handled Maresca’s time at the club.
“Chelsea is in a very particular situation where the manager can’t always act with complete autonomy and independence, and that’s also what happened with Enzo Maresca, who at a certain point had to say enough because the situation was unbearable.”
Branding it as a case of twisting the truth, the journalist said: “Now the whole thing has been twisted and turned around only to try to get out of it cleanly with the Blues fans, but everyone in the know knows that the truth isn’t what was told by the power of a press release and the power of money.”
🇧🇷 Kendry Páez | Chelsea talent offered to Brazilian club ➡️ Difficult situation for Blues https://t.co/03LDcICUlQ #cfc
— Sport Witness (@Sport_Witness) June 30, 2026
Our take: Two sides to every story
This feels like a close representation of Maresca’s version of the events. So if Chelsea have put their side out there, the new Manchester City manager is doing the same.
That said, Chelsea have struggled to find a long term manager in recent years, and it’s been apparent they haven’t had total power. Whether it’ll be different for Xabi Alonso remains to be seen.