Atletico Madrid are emptying their pockets to try to bring back Chelsea’s Diego Costa

A season and a half without Diego Costa is too much for Diego Simeone.

The Atletico Madrid boss wants to bring the Spanish international back from Chelsea, even if it costs the club an arm and a leg. The Spaniards enjoyed their most successful spell in recent history with the Brazilian-born attacker leading the line. They won La Liga at a time everyone said the Barca and Real Madrid stranglehold was unbreakable, and they were a minute or two away from winning the Champions League too. Costa took off for Chelsea though, guided them to the Premier League title and Simeone was force-fed Fernando Torres in the meantime. They lost on Saturday to Barcelona and now they're three points behind having played a game extra than their Catalan counterparts. So the chase for Costa has stepped up. The beauty of it? Atletico can guarantee him Champions League football while the Blues cannot. AS are reporting that the Madrid club have launched a €45m bid for the Spanish international but, the Spanish publication claim Chelsea have turned the bid down.

'The coach (Diego Simeone) has been very persuasive in convincing the club owner (Gil Marin) about the need to sign a striker," AS reports.

'Several names like Lucas Pérez were put on the table but Simeone was clear, "I want Costa."'

It seems Atletico will be signing someone on Monday regardless, but if they want that someone to be Costa they'll need to up their bid.