After a couple of weeks of reporting possible alternatives for Coutinho, the Catalan press have now swung completely the other way again, and are very much concentrating on the Liverpool player.
Taking another front page on Wednesday’s edition of Sport, Coutinho is once again said to be a signing Barcelona want as a club, and one which is backed up by the players.
Barca making a big effort to sign Coutinho has ‘heavyweight backing’, report the Catalan newspaper, with senior players advising the board. Those players are named as Luis Suarez, who is said to speak to Coutinho at least every week, and Paulinho, who, for Sport, has now gone from a signing they very much weren’t sure about to one of the pillars of the dressing room.
A couple of days ago it was said to be Lionel Messi’s renewal pushing the new Coutinho thirst, now there’s another reason… Paulinho and Suarez.
Barcelona players have been impressed by Coutinho’s ‘behind the scenes work’ to convince Liverpool to sell him, and that included getting FSG outline agreement for a January move.
Once again, Sport touch on Coutinho getting that agreement from the ‘leaders of Liverpool’, which would see him move for €150m this winter, but so far there’s been an insistence Barcelona won’t go near that.
Sport don’t repeat that insistence today.
