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Barcelona will 'fight' for Philippe Coutinho, with bid in excess of £90m expected
Barcelona will “fight” to sign Philippe Coutinho up until the transfer window closes with the growing expectation that they will soon submit an improved over after Liverpool flatly rejected a bid of £90million.
According to sources close to the deal Barcelona are still refusing to accept defeat in their pursuit of Coutinho who submitted a written transfer request when the latest offer was turned down by Liverpool last week. “The fight goes on,” a source said.
Although claims, made to Catalan television, by Barcelona general manager Pep Segura that a deal was “close” were dismissed as untrue by all parties the Spaniards are not backing down and it will be interesting to see the scale of their improved offer.
Coutinho clearly wants to leave Liverpool and believes that the offer from Barcelona is not only a once-in-the-lifetime opportunity for him but also a good deal, and a good price, for the Anfield club.
Fenway Sports Group, Liverpool’s American owners, strongly maintain that Brazilian is not for sale, while manager Jurgen Klopp said there is “nothing to say” because “no-one told me anything different”.
Klopp has also previously argued that it is too late in the window for Liverpool to sell but Barcelona’s determination has grown – not least following the shocking 5-1 defeat on aggregate to Real Madrid in the Spanish Super Cup.
The club are reeling, still, from Neymar’s world record £198million switch to Paris Saint-Germain and want Coutinho and Borussia Dortmund’s Ousmane Dembele, for a similar fee to the one offered for Coutinho, to appease supporters.
On Thursday they presented former Tottenham Hotspur midfielder Paulinho following his £36.4million switch from Chinese club Guangzhou Evergrande but bigger signings are desperately needed.
Barcelona have also suffered the blow of Luis Suarez being ruled out injured for four to five weeks with a knee injury while Gerard Pique stated that he felt “inferior” to Real for the first time in nearly a decade.
When questioned about whether Barcelona was a good move for Coutinho at present given their problems, Klopp dwelt on his own club’s positives.
“Can you imagine for a minute, I am not a little bit interested about the problems or not of Barcelona,” he said. “I don’t see a lot of reasons for each player to leave Liverpool at the moment and that’s just in general.
“I think for each player Liverpool is a very good club, a very good team in the moment.
“We have a good age of the group. We have very young boys, experience - it’s a good mix and we are on our way. I am very positive about the project of Liverpool.”
Coutinho was moved into a more central midfield role last season by Klopp as the German sought to build his team around the player.
The 25-year-old is currently struggling with back injury which is set to keep him out of Liverpool’s Premier League fixture against Crystal Palace on Saturday.
However, Klopp insists Liverpool can change their system and approach in Coutinho’s absence.
“Every team in the world would miss a creative player in whichever position of his quality,” added the German. “Having Phil not available was never cool but it happened. It is the situation and we always need to adapt.”