Should Chelsea swap Courtois for Costa?
With increasing rumours of Chelsea being the favourites to land in the prolific target man Diego Costa from Atletico Madrid, there are rumours with similar gravity of Thibaut Courtois being involved in the deal.
We have to look at both players’ value to their respective clubs. Courtois for Chelsea is an invaluable future goalkeeper who is arguably as good as Petr Cech, the current first choice. At just 21 years of age, Courtois is already among the top five keepers in the world. Chelsea currently lack a confident and prolific striker but having one of the best as well as most promising goal keepers, especially in a defensively solid system of game-play that Chelsea play.
Diego Costa is equally important to Atletico Madrid. Tormenting La-Liga defenders and competing with the likes of Ronaldo and Messi in goal-scoring, Costa has been instrumental in bringing the team to the top of the table as well as reaching the quarter finals of the Champions League. Despite such a prolific record and form, Diego Costa is not among the best strikers in the world. There are still better finishers than Costa and Atletico have always managed to kick start a striker’s career way too often with the style of football they play, as Fernando Torres, Diego Forlan, Sergio Aguero and Radamel Falcao were all Atletico strikers. There is no reason to believe that Atletico will not have another striker plundering goals next season.
But it is different for Chelsea. World class prospects in the goal keeping department are incredibly hard to find and Courtois is already an established keeper. Including him in a deal to bring Costa, who may or may not be prolific in a Chelsea shirt, is not a wise move according to me.
Costa is not a very technical player either. Costa uses his might and aggression to make space and shoot, something which makes him a basic yet clinical finisher. The Premier League is much tougher as there are some of the best defenders in the world playing. Even the mid table teams have strong and well established defenders who can stop players who rely on physical factors. If we consider the physically strong breed of strikers, we can consider Edinson Cavani or Radamel Falcao who are better technically and have established themselves in more than one league and in a more consistent manner. Diego Costa is also yet to perform internationally. He’s just attained Spanish nationality and the World Cup would be a crucial decider for his future.
The above mentioned are some of the reasons why Costa isn’t worth the swap, because all the factors are in favour of Courtois and not Costa. Yes Chelsea already have a world class keeper in Cech and yes, they need a prolific striker, but considering Courtois who is a full international and a first choice for Belgium and plays in a League where the best attackers in the world are playing, as we have Lionel Messi, Cristiano etc ,thus Courtois is already tried and tested to be performing at the best. Courtois is also consistent, according to Squawka., he makes 2.67 saves per goal conceded and also contributed to 16 clean sheets in La Liga.
The Verdict: Costa can be bought by the Blues, but not in a swap for Courtois. It must be a straight buy.