I’d rather have Diego Costa in my team than play against him. I love that kind of player, a player who fights for everything. I’m not patting him on the back for some of the bad things he does but you’ve got to take that as part of the make-up of the player. We’ve seen the same thing with Luis Suarez.
That’s what makes him the great player that he is. If you take it out of him you’re only getting half the player. So you’ve got to take the rough with the smooth and realise that every now and then he’s going to do something that sparks controversy, whether it’s biting, whether it’s stamping on people or whether it’s punching someone.
It’s in Costa’s nature to do something like that. With the first stamp against Liverpool on Tuesday he definitely knew what he was doing. He trod on Emre Can. He should have been sent off.
When I went on the pitch I was a different character to the person I am off it. I’d do anything to win. I stood on people, I’ve said things to get an advantage. I was terrible on the pitch. I’d give the referee a hard time. I used to fight and scrap. I knew I’d give it out so I had to be able to take it. If someone was trying to get one over on me I knew I had to get them back. Sometimes it would be pre-meditated. I’d wait and bide my time. Sometimes I’d get away with t and sometimes I wouldn’t.
I got sent off at Blackburn for calling the linesman a cheat. It was a stupid red card and afterwards Brian Kidd called me aside and said ‘what are you doing?’
But when the dust settles and everything calms down you realise yourself you’ve made a mistake. You apologise to your team-mates, you apologise to the manager. I was fined for getting sent off for a stupid red card. I wish I’d punched someone. I wish I’d get sent off for a worthy cause.
I played with lots of volatile characters and it’s in their nature – you can’t take it out of them. The obvious one is Roy Keane. I always found Roy was very loyal to his team-mates on the pitch. But he was very volatile with his tongue in the dressing room afterwards. He’d say it as it is. A lot of the lads respected what he said. He was very rarely wrong, but I always felt his timing was out. There was a time and a place to say things and sometimes he chose the wrong times to say things.
Stan Collymore was always quite volatile. As footballers and team-mates you’d always look at the individual and think, ‘he’s a volatile character, the switch could go at any moment’.
Costa got away with it, but is he’d have gotten sent off I probably would have said to him in the dressing room, ‘what are you doing? Just wait until the last minute of the game. We’re in the semi-final of the cup here. You could have cost me a chance of getting to Wembley. You could have cost the club a chance.’
So you’ve got to weigh it up. There’s a whole lot of things to add into the equation – who it is, the kind of character they are. Mourinho got involved and protected his player, like any manager would.
Afterwards Mourinho was critical of Jamie Redknapp and Sky. Firstly I think him and Jamie have history. There’s no love lost between the two. I think it’s over the Lampard situation and some things Jamie said about Chelsea last season.
And Mourinho is one who seems to hold grudges. Jamie put himself out there with a comment and Mourinho’s taken the bait and now he’s given him a bit of stick back. Mourinho knows how the media works. He knows sometimes you can’t sit on the fence and you have to say things.
I think if it’s constructive criticism and he has a go back then that’s unfair. We’ve all got an opinion and we’ve all got something to say. But I think if it’s personal a manager has got a right to say something.
But people forget that there’s a bit of history there. That’s probably why Mourinho’s come back and answered. If Jamie Carragher or Graeme Souness come out and said the same thing Mourinho probably wouldn’t have batted an eyelid.
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