Selling Coutinho To Barca Would Define Liverpool’s Summer!
I fear Liverpool’s hopes of keeping Philippe Coutinho at the club are fading.
EPSN are reporting that a deal has been agreed with FC Barcelona that will see the Brazilian playmaker end up at the Camp Nou.
That story suggests that Liverpool will get around £81.6m straight away and that figure could increase to £109m through bonuses. To me that’s not a great enough up-front fee, surely Liverpool will want £100m plus from the get go.
If you think that Liverpool went in for Naby Keita from RB Leipzig and couldn’t get him for £66m, it would be foolish to sell Coutinho for under £100m upfront.
So if Liverpool do accept a bid for the international forward, I’d expect it to be higher than that being currently reported.
I also suspect that Coutinho himself will have to be a driving force in getting the deal done.
If he doesn’t actually demand a transfer by handing in a written request, then why should Liverpool sell?
Obviously I can see going to Barca would be attractive for Philippe, the South American players are always tempted by the big two in Spain. Linking up again with Luis Suarez and playing with Lionel Messi would entice any forward thinking individual. But again he has to make it perfectly clear that he wants out of Anfield and let the fans know. Then he has to deal with the fall-out and accept that Barca have to do a deal with Liverpool.
See Liverpool can ill-afford to lose Coutinho this summer.
They certainly don’t need the money and know that they’ll struggle to find a replacement who can change Premier League games like the Brazilian maestro can.
The club also need to back their manager Jurgen Klopp, who has said that Coutinho will go nowhere. I think the German coach became disillusioned with life at Borussia Dortmund when he saw so many of his star players being sold. The situation is slightly different at Liverpool (financially), so it would be a gut punch to Klopp if he watched Coutinho jump ship with around three weeks left in the transfer window.
You also have to factor in that the Merseyside club have struggled to bring in their main transfer targets so far this summer. They balls up their pursuit of Virgil van Dijk, although they will remain hopeful that they can push that one through. I’ve already mentioned that they’ve not been able to reach an agreement with Leipzig regarding Keita.
So when you take all that into account and then you sell your best player that could be the worst case scenario for Liverpool. Morale at the club could plummet and the fans could turn on the board.
It could be a tricky few weeks for the Anfield outfit but they need to stay strong and stand firm. They can’t allow themselves to be bullied by Barca regarding any fee for Philippe Coutinho and they need to make sure that the attacker publicly states that he wants out!
If those key factors aren’t met then they don’t sell their star man and carry on.
Posted on August 8th, 2017 by scott
Filed under: Article
Countinho will make barcelona great again
81.6 up front is simply not good enough for player of Phillipe’s calibre considering current market value. It will be big loss for LFC if he leave for Barca.
Coutinho is going to barcalona apparently he has been orchestrating the move on the quite all summer and now neymar is gone it’s perfect timing, I would like to see liverpool quickly except this is a reality and with the reported 100 million pounds go find a suitable replacement because with 3 weeks of transfer window left it’s crucial we replace him
I think he’ll stay a year and go after that unless we are winning the league/cups/doing a last 16 or better in the champions league.
Not downplaying his ability or importance to the team but we were more heavily impacted by the loss of Mane than Coutinho. At a quick glance we got 2 points per game without Coutinho but only 0.7 without Mane during cup of nations. This is not comprehensive and literally just a skim through some fixtures.
The issue we have is that Coutinho is very unique and therefor almost irreplaceable so I would be much happier to have a team with him in it. It’s similar to Suarez in the way that there are strikers that can get 20/30 goals a season, just not the way he does it.
Just now Liverpool are in the same position as RB Leipzig and Saints so I see no reason why we cannot play hardball the same way they have. If Coutinho wants to leave then hand in a transfer request, if not have a gentlemans agreement in place if Barca do come calling.
If I’m honest, I’m resigned to losing him at some point but if we cannot recruit then we cannot sell. If we’d got Naby and Virgil then losing Coutinho, as painful as it would be, may have been palatable.
With Lallana being injured and not replacement being bought I can’t see him leaving but I’ve been wrong before.
Apologies for the length of the comment 🙂
Good point about Mane, he was definitely missed when missing last season. Still think Coutinho offers more in the really important times during big games.
Yeah I agree don’t see any reason for Liverpool not to play hardball and get as much money as possible. Can see them getting VVD but not Naby at this stage.
Also seems Ousmane Dembele to Barca is a goer. So a few more twists and turns I’d imagine.
I definitely do not think we will sell coutinho but I think Klopp being the type of person he is will sell him next year. To be honest I don,t know why barca want him knowing we won,t sell him. There are some players who are just as good as him, not many, but they are out there. I guessed straight away by what Neymar has been saying all summer what was going on. I also feel that coutinho has been talking to Barcelona and made them aware that he wants to play for them. He certainly is not innocent in all of this just two faced. He doesn’t,t want any aggro but has commandeered plenty!