Chelsea striker Diego Costa was certainly his usual self again Monday night in the Blues season opener. His latest controversy surrounds his tackle on Adrian during Chelsea’s win over West Ham. Costa was not carded for the incident and he will not face any charges from the Football Association over it.
Scoring goals and causing controversy, this is the Diego Costa that you pay to see. The controversial forward is lovable if he’s on your team, loath-worthy is he’s not.
However, Costa seems to feel that his polarizing reputation isn’t all that fair. He thinks that he’s been unfairly targeted by referees in England.
By the time the incident occurred, Costa had already been booked for approaching referee Anthony Taylor. That’s an infraction that has been made automatically punishable by a yellow card this season.
Speaking to ESPN Brazil about the rule change after the game, Diego Costa said: “I’m finding this out now, because it was the second time I went to speak to him [the referee] that he gave me a card straight away.”
“I found it a bit strange but later on I understood and after the first half I apologized.”
He then added: “Here I’m marked by referees, I’m going to be honest.”
“People always have — if I do anything, it’s different to what any other footballer does, and we need to see this because people marked me and I have to deal with it and ask God that these things don’t mess me up or take away opportunities of the game that happens with suspension.”
Lots of football figures, friend and foe alike, find Costa to be one who often bends and sometimes breaks the rules.
His teammate, defender Kurt Zouma, said last season that Diego Costa likes to cheat a lot. Zouma would later walk back those comments on Twitter somewhat.
After their match in January, Arsenal Manager Arsene Wenger said Costa deliberately got Per Mertesacker sent off, and he described the polarizing striker as “clever.”
It might be the most pejorative usage of the word “clever” in human history. Former Arsenal Chairman But Hill-Wood, 1982-2013 saw Wenger’s critique, and raised the bet.
“He is a serial cheat and he gets away with it,” Hill-Wood is quoted in the Daily Star when speaking about Diego Costa.
“I think he deliberately ran in front of Mertesacker, who hardly touched him. Yet Costa rolls around as if his legs have been cut off. Once the red card’s been shown, he’s suddenly perfectly all right again.”
“That’s because there’s absolutely nothing wrong with him. There certainly wasn’t soon after when he scored that goal. Personally I think the referee should have sent him off for diving. It’s very annoying because to me it is blatant,” Hill-Wood continued.
“I thought Arsene was very restrained because he must have been furious. He gets criticized or penalized by the FA if he says too much.”
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, partnered with FOX Sports Engage Network. and News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, currently contributes regularly to the Chicago Tribune’s RedEye publication and Bold Global.
He also consistently appears on numerous radio and television talk shows all across the country. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram and Sound Cloud.