Diego Simeone reveals the ‘problem’ Chelsea gave Atletico Madrid in Diego Costa transfer talks

Diego Simeone has confirmed that
Atletico Madrid wanted to re-sign Diego
Costa from Chelsea but admits the
Premier League leaders held the upper
hand in negotiations.
The 28-year-old joined Stamford Bridge
in a £32 million deal in 2014 and won the
Premier League in his first season under
Jose Mourinho.
The Spain international struggled in his
second campaign and was wanted by
Atletico in the summer as a replacement
for Jackson Martinez, who was sold
to Guangzhou Evergrande for £31m in
February.
‘I was crystal clear with Diego about what
we were trying to do and how long we’d
wait for an answer and that’s why we’ve
still got a great relationship today,’
Simeone told Marca.
‘The problem we came up against was
that there tend not to be buyout clauses
in England and so Chelsea could say to
us: ‘we want £180m’ or ‘we don’t want to
sell’.
‘From my point of view both I and the
club did everything we possibly could to
get him back to Atletico but what
happened was we set a date after which
we had to take action and we signed
Kevin Gameiro instead.’