While Luka Jovic marked his return to Eintracht Frankfurt by scoring as many goals in 20 minutes as he did in 18 months at Real Madrid, it was a weekend to forget for another Bundesliga ace looking to kick-start his career in familiar surroundings.
With the benefit of hindsight, Douglas Costa’s decision to embark on a second spell at Bayern Munich seemed an odd one from the get-go.
Hansi Flick already had three of the best wingers in world football at his disposal and, unsurprisingly, the 30-year-old Juventus loanee has not found game-time easy to come by with Serge Gnabry, Kingsley Coman and the £55 million Leroy Sane for competition.
Costa has started just three Bundesliga matches in five months, his only goal coming against Stuttgart in November. And the Brazil international was left out of the squad entirely during Sunday’s nerve-shredding 2-1 triumph over free-scoring Freiburg.
If he’s not hit rock bottom just yet, then he’s certainly plummeting towards it.
“Douglas Costa and (fellow summer signing) Bouna Sarr weren’t in the squad today because we also have a lot of healthy players,” explained Flick, confirming that a man who lifted two Bundesliga titles under Pep Guardiola during his first spell in Germany had been omitted for tactical reasons (90Min).
“It’s a good thing. We had to make a decision today and it hit them both.”
According to Gazzetta dello Sport, there is now a very real chance that Costa’s loan spell at the Allianz Arena will be cut short. Given that the £100,000-a-week wideman has no future under Andrea Pirlo at Juventus either, Costa appears to be lodged tightly between a rock and a hard place.
Gazzetta adds that, in an ideal world, a Premier League club will come calling with Wolverhampton Wanderers a potential destination for a man represented by (guess who?) Jorge Mendes.
Wolves could certainly do with a spark of inspiration, slipping down the table and into 14th place thanks to a six-game winless run.
But, during a testing season at Molineux, Pedro Neto, Daniel Podence and the admittedly-consistent Adama Traore have stood out a mile. It’s hard to imagine Costa being anything other than an expensive benchwarmer at Molineux – a role he has become all-too accustomed with.
Receive exclusive football transfer news and updates twice a week to your mailbox
