Coutinho is waiting for Newcastle United to be bought by the Saudis, so they can afford his transfer fee and bring him to the north east from sunny Barcelona…
Who’d have thought that would be the position he’d be in a few years back when he virtually downed tools for Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool ahead of a £145m transfer to Camp Nou?
But according to Guillem Balague, Spanish football expert, this is the situation. Balague also completely ruled out any chance of Coutinho rejoining Liverpool, under any circumstances, claiming any talk of it as a possibility is agent-led and not based on fact.
“We know the ‘new’ Newcastle, when their takeover is confirmed which everyone expects it to be, will enter a new era and Coutinho is waiting for that to happen,” he told Sport.
“His representatives believe Newcastle will make an attempt to get him because he is the kind of the player they can have as I have said before, they should go for players who are finishing their contract like Cavani.
“The biggest effort Coutinho’s representatives are doing is towards the Premier League and the idea is for him to go to the Premier League.
“There has been talk of Arsenal but nothing has arrived from them, and also talk of going back to Liverpool on loan.
“No truth whatsoever.
“So we don’t need to talk about it any more, do we?
“Liverpool are not interested, no offer has existed and I understand that the work the representatives have to do is to make it look like there is an auction but there isn’t such a thing at the moment.
“The favourites if you have to choose from the Premier League are Newcastle if the (takeover) bid comes in and if they make an offer for him of some kind that Barcelona is happy with.
“They want to get rid of Coutinho, that’s for certain, but at this point everything is possible including him staying but that seems unlikely.”
We actually want Coutinho to get a good move – and would be intrigued to see our former no.10 at St. James’ Park…
They’ve always been one of our favourite clubs in England, although that would dramatically change if they sold their soul to the Saudis, who are on a blatant sports-washing mission.
As for Phil, he just needs a move. He’d obviously most like an Anfield return, but the club is not going to spend the kind of money it would require to secure his services – either on loan and especially not permanently – as Balague suggests.