The Mill is intrigued by reports that “relations between Chelsea and Diego Costa have deteriorated”. How much worse could things have got? Has Costa moved from Brazil to the moon? Have there been tweets about fire and fury? No, apparently not. Instead what’s happened is Chelsea have cleared out the player’s locker at the club’s training ground and pushed his car from a first-team spot to a youth-team bay.
A youth-team bay! Not even to a car crusher. And since there are no reports of the locker contents being incinerated in a public fire, it seems there’s still some love between Chelsea and Costa, after all. He’ll be banging in goals for them against Atlético Madrid in the Champions League in a few weeks, you wait and see. By January he could be laying out blue bunting at Stamford Bridge to welcome Thomas Müller, assuming Arsenal do not beat Chelsea to the signing of the Bayern Munich forward.
Crystal Palace have suggested to Frank de Boer that if Joel Ward doesn’t play like Johan Cruyff against Burnley this weekend, then the manager’s car will be moved to a bay outside the nearest job centre. Or words to that effect.
Ashley Young is ready for showdown talks with José Mourinho, who is understood to be happy to sit down for a chat with the player so long as the manager is allowed to mention his sponsored watch every 30 seconds. Young is expected to agree to that in the hope of not being sold to West Brom in January.
Everton are preparing to swoop for the Porto defender Iván Marcano. Very good, Ronald, but … A STRIKER, A STRIKER, A STRIKER!
Liverpool are refusing to include a release clause in a new contract for Emre Can, which means the player looks likely to leave at the end of this season. Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain is getting his hopes up. Ben Woodburn, meanwhile, is close to agreeing a new deal at Anfield, with some giddy Welsh people understood to have suggested that any release clause for the youngster should be set at whatever Gareth Bale’s worth plus £100m.
Hatem Ben Arfa is considering taking legal action against Paris Saint-Germain over the way the club has treated him since he declined a transfer away during the summer.
Lille fans, already angry over the summer sale to Bordeaux of the striker Nicolas de Préville, are increasingly baffled by the mysterious ways of their manager, Marcelo Bielsa, after it was revealed that the manager turned down opportunities to buy either Wilfried Bony or Vincent Janssen to replace the departed De Préville. Steady on, Lille fans, there’s method to those decisions by El Loco.