Diego Costa to Atletico Madrid: Spaniards confident of completing £40m deal for Chelsea striker in next few days
Diego Simeone's La Liga side are confident of landing the striker they sold to the Blues for £32million
ATLETICO MADRID will step up their bid to sign Chelsea’s Diego Costa within the next few days.
The La Liga side are confident of landing the striker they sold to the Blues for £32million.
Executives at the Spanish club are putting together a bid of around £40m, while the squad continues their pre-season preparations in Australia.
Atletico’s renewed interest has already annoyed Chelsea who have accused them of tapping up their Brazilian-born Spanish star.
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Costa, 27, still has three years of his five-year Blues contract left to run.
He fired them to the Prem title in his first season with 20 league goals.
But he went off the boil last term, netting just 12 goals in 28 appearances.
He has long been linked with a move back to Atletico and fuelled speculation he is about to return by posting a bizarre message on social media after Chelsea’s 1-0 victory over Liverpool in a friendly in the USA on Wednesday.
New Stamford Bridge boss Antonio Conte has said he would like Costa to stay but could not guarantee it.
Sources at Atletico — who beat Tottenham 1-0 in a friendly here last night — believe they will re-sign their former hitman, who notched 64 goals for the club before moving to England.
Chelsea have complained to the Spaniards about their public and bullish attempts to lure Costa to the Vicente Calderon Stadium.
The Blues are considering taking their gripe to Fifa as one of the transfer sagas of the summer shows no sign of slowing down.