Reports earlier today, from both Marca and AS, claimed that no agreement has been reached between Chelsea, Atletico Madrid, and Diego Costa regarding the striker’s expected return to Spain, but a tweet from journalist Manu Sainz later in the day has set fire to that impasse.
That translates to “The signing of Diego Costa by Atletico will be official in the next few hours”, though it’s unclear just how few is few hours.
With Costa’s fate decided some time ago — set to sit out until January when Atleti’s FIFA transfer ban expires and they can register new players again — the only question remaining was the fee between the two clubs. A few recent stories have claimed that Chelsea may have accepted a £22m bid (+incentives), which is a fair bit lower than our recent £50m hopes (and certainly much lower than the £76m from China that supposedly was on the table once), but it is what it is. Costa’s future at Chelsea had become untenable; any decent amount is a good amount at this point.
We should know soon enough just how quickly these “few hours” will come to pass. Stay tuned.