Diego Costa and the truth behind those bust-up reports

As news broke on Friday night that Diego Costa had not travelled to Chelsea's Premier League fixture at Leicester, hares were set running. The story, broken by a national newspaper around the time Chelsea arrived at their East Midlands hotel for the night, talked of unrest.

It was claimed Costa had not trained for three days, that there had been a £30m-a-year offer from China to the forward, that a bust-up had taken place with Antonio Conte – with the manager concluding it by telling him to 'go to China’.

The social media mayhem which followed was further bolstered by an Instagram post in which Costa simply said 'Come on Chelsea!!!', followed by a Blue heart. Meanwhile, pictures did the rounds online purporting to show Costa in training from earlier in the day – the inference being the story could not be true.

And the following day at Leicester it was made clear by club sources pre-match, confirmed on the record by Conte afterwards, that Costa had picked up a back injury and pulled out of training on Tuesday – not returning since that moment. So who can we believe?

First of all: there is no reason to disbelieve Conte's insistence that Costa had not trained since Tuesday. He implored assembled journalists, and by dint of that readers and viewers beyond, to believe what he said was true.

Some have insisted they have seen pictorial evidence Costa did train post-Tuesday, but it is worth looking closer at those frames. Footage shared on social media by the club on Thursday, apparently showing a Costa shot saved in training by Asmir Begovic, is a red herring: it was filmed on a sunny day, several months back, and uploaded as a matter of banter between the two players.

Another shot, apparently of a snood-clad Costa running out on a snow-covered training pitch on Friday morning, actually depicts team-mate Kenedy.

There is no Zapruder footage here: and it should be taken at face value that what Conte says is true. But, before slating the matter as some media fabrication, it is important to note what Conte did not say. At no stage did he deny there had been a bust-up, with him or any other member of the coaching staff, despite repeatedly being asked about this.

In fact, he pretty much said: if there was something going on, then he wouldn't share this with us reporters – as he has always dealt with these things in the changing room. That is a matter of good management.

When asked if there had been an offer from China, he also failed to deny it – saying simply that he knew nothing of it. And when asked if Costa would play for Chelsea again, Conte changed the subject to that of a win on the pitch, without answering the question. Only later did he add a quizzical: “Why not?”

You would be forgiven for assuming this to be some sort of media fishing exercise – and, from time to time, they do happen. But the situation in this case is that well-sourced reports exist of the claimed bust-up, and these have been corroborated by other sources which one might usually expect to have different interests at heart.

Readers often get frustrated with the use of 'sources' by journalists. But the quality of sources used in this story, and the degree to which their claims have been backed-up, means that we can be more or less certain the claimed events took place. As for Costa's Instagram: an account run by his people, and a post published in an attempt to calm a growing furore.

But where does this all leave Costa and Chelsea? Similarly well-sourced reports suggested Costa's team-mates had urged the player to apologise to his manager for the events – whether or not that happens may frame what happens in coming days.

On Costa's part: his head has clearly been turned by the Chinese offer. Though the reported £30m a season in China is far more than he will get in London, Chelsea have offered him a new contract worth around £10m a season – that is, per month, what the average working man or woman is paid in a lifetime.

Plus, a common belief among those who know even a little about him, is that he enjoys the both the challenge and the adulation of being among the best players in the world's best league, and would miss that were he to go for a well-paying pantomime role in China.

Costa is on the brink of something big with Chelsea: keep it steady, and he could have a Premier League medal, Player of the Year gong, and Golden Boot by May. For those reasons it seems unlikely he will go anywhere in January.

But these reports of unrest are to be believed, and the waters for him at Chelsea look muddy, without a major shift in contract negotiations before the season's end.