Lampard: Costa hard to replace at Chelsea
LONDON: Premier League champions Chelsea will find it difficult to replace influential striker Diego Costa if he departs in the current transfer window, club legend Frank Lampard has said.
Costa, 28, has been Chelsea’s top scorer in all three seasons since joining the club in 2014, leading them to two league title wins.
Last month, the Spain international said that he would leave Stamford Bridge after being told by manager Antonio Conte that he was not a part of the club’s future plans.
“He’s a fantastic striker and we all saw that last season and since he’s been at Chelsea. He would be very difficult to replace, there’s no doubt about it,” Lampard said.
“He’s an all-round physical presence that also has the quality to get goals, that’s not easy to find in the modern day.”
Costa scored 22 goals in 42 appearances for the London side last season but the club have been linked with a move to get Everton striker Romelu Lukaku, who scored 26 goals last campaign, back to Stamford Bridge.
“He’s (Lukaku) certainly developed to a huge degree since he left the club (in 2014), Romelu would certainly be a good option. The only thing Chelsea have to look at is the inflated market that is around now, it makes it very tough,” Lampard said.
Costa has said he would favour a return to former club Atletico Madrid but the Spanish side are unable to register new players until January 2018 due to a transfer ban by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).
Meanwhile, Chelsea midfielder Nathaniel Chalobah is hoping to cement his place at Stamford Bridge after making a breakthrough for the Premier League champions under Conte last season.
The 22-year-old, who joined Chelsea’s academy at the age of 10, was sent out on six loan spells before the Italian boss decided to keep him at the club at the start of last campaign.
“He (Conte) showed faith in me in pre-season and he liked the way I was working,” Chalobah, who made nine of his 10 league appearances from the bench,said.
“He made a decision to keep me ... so the way I see it is that I’m in a better position than I was last year. We won the league and I have got competition ahead of me in (N’golo) Kante, (Cesc) Fabregas and (Nemanja) Matic. And we’re talking European Cup winners, World Cup winners and full internationals, and these are players that you can learn from every single day, in terms of what they do on the pitch and the way they are off the pitch.”
Chalobah has also been a success for England in the youth levels, making his Under-21 debut in 2012 at the age of 17. – Reuters