It’s been a couple of years since Antonio Conte left Chelsea under pretty rough circumstances.
He had won the league with the club, but the happiness soon turned to sorrow the next season.
Conte seemed to lose some of the dressing room, and he had disagreements with the board of transfer targets and failure of them to secure players that he wanted to sign.
It all felt rather inevitable, sad, and relieving when Conte finally left the club in 2018, but the love affair was just not meant to be.
During his time, Conte had quite a public fallout with Chelsea striker and fan favourite, Diego Costa.
Costa was a character, but his head was elsewhere and he gave off the impression that he no longer enjoyed working under Conte.
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Conte has never spoken about this situation since leaving Chelsea, but he has opened up in an interview with The Telegraph, and in typical Conte style, he says it how it is.
He said:
“First of all, I am a person that doesn’t want to speak badly about a situation with a player from a club that I trained.
“It’s right always to keep good memories and I prefer to keep good memories also about Diego Costa because we won together a league title in an incredible season.
“But, for sure, the truth, we know the truth. The player, his agent, the club and I. We know how many times he asked to go away to Atletico Madrid at the start of the season, during the season to go to China, and at the end of the season to join, again, Atletico Madrid.
“This is the truth and, honestly, in my career I want to have players who are concentrated on my team and not to consider my team a second choice. My team must be the first choice.
“It was an incredible season and I managed, together with the club, the Diego Costa situation in the best possible way. But, in the end, the truth was only that the player wanted to leave many times to Atletico Madrid and during the season to go to China because he wanted the best contract.”