In case you thought we’d get a reprieve from the Diego Costa rumors for a short little while following the conclusion of the January transfer window ... well, I hope you enjoyed your 24-48 hours of freedom.
Here’s Spanish radio station Cadena SER and their daily football show El Larguero with the big-bada-boom.
D'après la SER, Diego Costa quittera Chelsea pour la Chine cet été. Transfert : 85M€.
— François Miguel (@fmboudet) February 2, 2017
Salaire : 30M€ nets par an
Accord "total et absolu"
The story hawked by the radio is that Diego Costa has a “total and absolute” agreement with an unnamed Chinese Super League club, possibly (probably?) the same one or perhaps a different one that supposedly bid €85m last month. Costa’s suitors in January were Tianjin Quanjian, but they ended up signing Pato of all people instead (so much for proving yourself in Europe, eh, Duckie?) so they may be at their foreign player allocation limit.
It could of course all be nonsense as well, though Spanish radio tends to be a bit more trustworthy than Spanish print media, even if that may not be saying much. It does however jive with Matt Law’s recent prognostications of Diego Costa’s future at Chelsea being far from assured beyond this season and of course the continued links with Alvaro Morata and, lately, with Celtic’s Moussa Dembele.
So. Here we go again.