Diego Costa: Chelsea's costly error

A master of the dark arts; this was the term Mark Hughes used to describe Diego Costa in 2017, accusing the latter of being overtly physical and going down very easily under challenges at the same time.A controversial personality, to say the least, Diego Costa was indeed feisty in his time with Chelsea, racking up 10 yellow cards in the 2016-17 season along with his 20 goals and 7 assists. Yet, a falling out with Conte meant Costa was not part of Chelsea's Premier League story for the 2017-18 season and was promptly shipped off to Atletico Madrid. January 2018 saw him make his second debut with the club.Alvaro Morata's arrivalAlvaro Morata arrived from Real Madrid for £58m last summer and from what we've seen so far, he hasn't really settled at Stamford Bridge. Along with Lukaku and Lacazette, Morata has sometimes failed to show up on the big occasions and has exhibited instances of poor finishing as well.He may be excellent in the air, but he not as robust or physical as Costa. He fared fairly well at Real Madrid but seems like a square peg in a round hole at Chelsea.While Chelsea have not stooped to miserable lows, they are nowhere near the clinical and cruel side they were in Conte's first season with a mere 3 draws and 5 losses to end the campaign as Champions. They had a penchant for late goals and most of them came from Diego Costa himself.In his 20 Premier League goals last season, 6 were after the 80th-minute mark. 5 of his goals were match-winners and 1 helped to convert a loss into a draw. Costa's cutting edge is something that Chelsea have lacked this season while playing out stalemates. In the following slides, we look back at some of Costa's game-changing goals.#1 August 15th, 2016, Chelsea 2 - 1 West Ham In the very first match of the season, Costa, amidst a fair share of controversy, scored the winning goal in the 89th minute to secure 3 points for Chelsea. He was lucky to be on the pitch at the time.Though it appeared that the spoils were about to be shared, Costa shrugged off Collins to receive Batshuayi's cushioned header.The defenders backed off for a second too many and Costa proceeded to hit a shot that went on to nestle in the bottom-right corner of the net beyond the reach of the keeper. This ensured that Chelsea stared the season with a win.

Diego Costa: Chelsea's costly error

#3 September 11th, 2016, Swansea 2 - 2 Chelsea