VICE Sports Player of the Weekend: Diego Costa

This article originally appeared on VICE Sports UK.

Calm down, we know Diego Costa didn't actually play at the weekend – that's sort of the point. While he was busy failing to warm up, throwing his bib around and making a dick of himself off the field, Chelsea were busy remembering how to actually be something approaching good on it. Was it a coincidence that this happened while Costa wasn't playing? We think not.

Diego Costa threw his warm up at Mourinho— Troll Football (@Troll__Football)November 29, 2015

Through his absence, Costa freed up the Chelsea frontline in a way he hasn't managed on the pitch for around a year now. With the likes of Willian, Oscar, Pedro and Hazard able to happily swap positions at will, cause havoc with their pace and link up in the final third, the reigning champions actually carried some threat on the break, which fitted well with their game plan.

Jose Mourinho paid Tottenham an awful lot of respect with the way he set his side up and will be pleased with the point he took from White Hart Lane, which, as signs of the times go, was pretty significant. Chelsea defended deep, worked hard in midfield and broke with real skill, invention and intent. Hazard looked sharper than he has done all season and Pedro threatened numerous times, showing the footballing brain that comes with years of training at Barcelona.

Willian, when not fulfilling his role as Lord of the Dead Ball, was as tireless and energetic as anyone on the field. Oscar showed flashes of his best, with a couple of nutmegs thrown in for good measure, and there was a whiff of fun about their play together that wasn't necessarily expected. Sort of like kids having a laugh while the teacher was out of the room, they flourished because Costa wasn't there to slow down the play, waste chances and spend more time scrapping with defenders than actually attacking the goal.

If you want to be harsh, you could boil down the genuinely exceptional period of Diego Costa's career into little more than a season and a half. The year Athletico Madrid defied the odds and won La Liga and reached the Champions League final, he was undeniably one of the very best forwards in the world. His penchant for the dickhead-esque dark arts was excused by periods of wonderful play, holding the ball up, scoring crucial goals and mucking in at the back. Signing for Chelsea, it seemed that Mourinho had found his partner in crime, a man who seemed so hungry to win that his conduct regularly strayed into Americans on Black Friday territory, with the goals to match.

His initial partnership was Cesc Fabregras seemed unstoppable, too. With the Spaniard supplying him more often than Snoop Dogg's dealer, Costa raced ahead in the goalscoring charts. Pundits were quick to point out that removing the aggression from his game would effect his positive exploits, making it a worthwhile trade-off. He was the guy everyone had in their fantasy team, and therefore the reason why so many people didn't mind Chelsea winning all the time. But in the second half of the campaign he spent more time kicking other people than the ball, cards replaced goals, and the complete pantomime villain was born.

There's something to admire about someone who's become so bad at something that they're actually of more use away from the action than attempting to contribute, but Chelsea are no strangers to that, either. The current home of Radamel Falcao, another former world beater at Atléti turned figure of fun, the trend may have begun when Roman Abramovich splashed out £50 million on Fernando Torres, who had to go back to Madrid to find happiness and form after completely breaking down in West London and becoming a laughing stock.

Given what happened with Felipe Luis – who also joined Chelsea from Athletico Madrid as one of the standout players in his position, but then contributed so little he u-turned a season later – the likes of Diego Simeone and Antoine Griezmann may want to think things through throughly if Chelsea ever do come calling.

Anyone who's ever talked a friend through a break-up will inevitably have used the phrase "you're better off without them, mate" in consolation, but at the moment Chelsea genuinely do look like a better side without the world's oldest looking 27-year-old staggering about the final third like your still-pissed mate at Sunday league. So bad the Spanish probably regret granting him citizenship, now isn't the best time to be Diego Costa.

Has he peaked and already played the best football of his career? Who knows. At the minute it looks like he might be another that has to rejoin Atléti to remember how to play the game as well as he once did. Maybe he just had a golden period where he played in a fashion that he couldn't match before, and has failed to since.

There's an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm where Larry David is told that donating a wing to a hospital is only a truly selfless act if you do it anonymously, and perhaps that's the thinking behind what Costa is currently doing. This could simply be his (metaphorical) Thích Quảng Đức moment; the ultimate example of silently taking one for the team.

All that said, what we do know for certain is that for services to broken character and unwitting contribution through absence, Diego Costa is our Player of the Weekend.

@bainsxiii