Diego Costa's World Cup dreams in danger
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E-mail Xinhua, May 27, 2014
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Diego Costa is a serious doubt ahead of the World Cup. |
Spain striker Diego Costa is in serious danger of missing the World Cup finals after it was confirmed on Monday that he has a small muscle tear in his right hamstring and will need to rest for at least 2 weeks.
Costa was forced out of Saturday's Champions League Final, which his side, Atletico Madrid, lost 4-1 to Real Madrid after just nine minutes of the game.
The week previously he had also needed to leave the field in the first half of Atletico's final league game of the season in which they sealed the Spanish league title with a 1-1 draw away to Barcelona.
The striker underwent tests at the 'Clinico Centro' in Madrid and afterwards the Clinic Director, Pedro Guillen confirmed the striker needed to "rest for at least two weeks."
"He has small muscle tear .. maybe he won't be there," added the doctor.
Spain kick off the defense of their World title on June 13, in just 18 days, meaning Costa may or may not have recovered from his injury in time to take his place in the line-up for the match against Holland.
Sunday saw Spain coach Vicente del Bosque give a list of 19 players for his side's friendly game against Bolivia on May 30. Del Bosque will give his final list of 23 players to travel to Brazil after that game and commented that he would not take players, "who are struggling," adding that the 23 players who will travel to the USA to begin acclimatizing for Brazil would have to be in "perfect condition to train."
Given this is not going to be the case for Costa, the striker could find himself being replaced by either Fernando Llorente of Alvaro Negredo, who were surprise omissions from the list of players named on Sunday by Del Bosque.
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