Southampton striker Graziano Pelle has insisted that Diego Costa's "dirty play" is necessary to be effective in the Premier League.
The Chelsea forward was this week banned for three games for his stamp on Liverpool's Emre Can in the second leg of the Capital One Cup semi-final.
However, Pelle is adamant that forwards need to use aggression to match the treatment that they receive off defenders.
He told reporters: "He plays in a dirty way. But this is the way how he plays. He is a good player. When I was playing for Feyenoord, Joris Mathijsen said, 'Costa is a good player but he is an assassin. You are not'.
"But every game here [in the Premier League] I go off the field with my ankle bruised. England is like this. If you don't give back, you will receive 100% [bad treatment]. Until something happens that is serious - and nobody got injured in the end - it's okay.
"It's important that you shouldn't do something bad to somebody and destroy his career. But it could happen to you. You never know when somebody will step on your feet. When somebody steps on Costa he doesn't say a lot. He gets his own back. I like that."
Costa has scored 17 goals in the Premier League this season for the Blues.
Simon Sinclair
