‘Everyone involved’: PSG coach Luis Enrique plays down Joao Pedro shove

Paris Saint-Germain manager Luis Enrique has insisted he was trying to separate players during a post-match brawl at the end of his team Club World Cup final defeat against Chelsea.

Despite heading into the game as favourite, a dominant display from Chelsea saw PSG conceed three goals in the first 45 minutes. Cole Palmer bagged a brace before setting up João Pedro for the third goal.

Chelsea’s 3-0 win ended with bad tempered scenes following an 86th minute red card shown to PSG’s João Neves for pulling the hair of Blues defender Marc Cucurella and the two sets of players clashed at the final whistle.

Pedro, Gianluigi Donnarumma and Achraf Hakimi were all involved in a confrontation before Luis Enrique seemed to push the Chelsea forward in the face. But the former Barcelona coach said that while the scenes were “not what was best,” he said that he was attempting to calm the situation.

Cole Palmer #10 celebrates scoring Chelsea’s second goal with team mates Joao Pedro #20 and Reece James #24 during the FIFA Club World Cup 2025 Final match between Chelsea FC and Paris Saint-Germain. (Photo by Alex Grimm/Getty Images)

“I have no problem expressing my feeling at the end of the game in a high level of pressure,” he told reporters. “It’s very stressful for all of us. It is going to be impossible to avoid that.

“Everybody was involved. It was not what was best and the end result of the pressure of the match.

“I have seen [Chelsea coach Enzo] Maresca. I saw he had pushed others and we had to separate all the players and I do not know where that pressure came from.

“But this is a situation we must all avoid. That goes without saying. My intention is that I wanted to separate the footballers, so the situations didn’t become worse.”

Quizzed about the incident, Chelsea’s Pedro said he thought some of the team may have temporarily lost their heads after the loss, but seemed to write the situation off.

“I don’t need to say about them because it’s normal. Everyone wants to win the game and, in the end, I think they lost their heads,” Pedro said. “But this is football, this has happened and now we need to enjoy it because we won the tournament, that’s it. I don’t want to talk too much about them because you know how it works. Football is this.”

Chelsea victory denied PSG the chance to add a world title to their Champions League crown but Luis Enrique said his team were not “losers.”

“We are not losers, there are no losers,” he said. “We are the runners-up. A loser is somebody who gives up. In this high level of sport there are no losers whatsoever.”