Del Bosque: Diego Costa was left out of Spain squad for “sporting reasons”
Posted Friday, June 12, 2015 by Caughtoffside.com
Spain manager Vicente del Bosque insists that Chelsea’s Diego Costa was left out of the current squad as a result of his fitness issues, reports AS (via Football Espana).
Costa enjoyed a very successful first year at Chelsea after arriving from Atletico Madrid, and he helped the club to end a five-year wait for the title by scoring 20 goals in the Premier League. He had an excellent chance conversion rate of 34.5%, and he also created 41 chances for his teammates.
The striker struggled with hamstring issues throughout the campaign though and Del Bosque insists that is why he wasn’t included in his plans to face Costa Rica and Belarus.
Costa has only scored one goal in seven appearances for Spain, and his commitment to the national team was questioned when he pulled out of international duty last year, as reported by IBTimes.
Del Bosque said “I’ve been adamant about this. He hasn’t come for sporting reasons. Everything I’ve heard hasn’t approached the reality.
''We thought we didn’t see him in his best condition. We haven’t taken a disciplinary measure and we have nothing against him, or thought he won’t be called up in future.”
Juan Mata was also left out of the squad, despite a successful second half of the season with Manchester United.
The midfielder hasn’t featured for the national side since their poor showing at last year’s World Cup, and Del Bosque revealed that it “hurts” to leave out a player of his quality.
He added: “Juan Mata is one of the few other players it hurts not to bring but we didn’t have space for him. He has quality and we always, always, have him in mind when coming up with the squad list.”
Spain are currently second in their Euro 2016 qualifying group, three points behind Slovakia with five games left to play.
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