Philippe Coutinho on leaving Liverpool, why he had to join Barcelona and 'the statement' Virgil van Dijk made - Liverpool Echo
I really don’t know right now how I’ll ultimately feel about him. Emotions are all over the place.
On the one hand, you get things like this. As professional and proper as he’s been the vast majority of his time here. Not least when he has played and given everything. Often to an exceptionally high level. The good memories are more than plentiful.
On the other, this is a professional footballer who refused to do his job, twice over, to get another. Openly lying over injury to jib out of playing. The first time potentially putting at risk a whole season's hard graft by swerving the Hoffenheim qualifier. The second, you presume going off Klopp’s words his statement, disrupting the changies to such an extent it left his position untenable and a club that had offered him everything to stay little option but to move him on. Along with lying about injury again to sack off a crucial league and Cup game. Which would have rolled through the whole of January like it did August. Two months off, on full pay, when there’s nottin’ wrong with you. Nice work if you can get it.
I think ultimately I’ll remember the good with him more that FAR outweighs the bad. The heart thumping excitement he’s given me the match with his countless Worldie goals. The sublime assists seeing things very few others can. Let alone the execution to complete them. But right here, right now, there’s a lot of anger and more so serious disappointment in him dor how he’s behaved. And that sadly will always tinge the way he’s viewed.
For me, the way Suarez went around things was FAR worse. Another lad prepared to strike to force a move to F Arsenal of all teams before Stevie and a few others talked him down to stay a final year. Then bringing shame and embarrassment, not for the first time, on the club, his teammates and every last L’pool supporter out there with another bite in front of the World to calculatingly force L’pools hand and get his move.
But at the least, Suarez gave us that last great season where he left NOTHING on the park every game. Phil couldn't even do that.
He talked about the special nature of L’pool and its fans when he signed the last contract. How you couldn’t beat that fan passion anywhere. Statues built and all that. Yet Luis Suarez, for all his faults, remains a fan hero and would be welcomed back tomorrow with open arms tomorrow by the majority. Phil Coutinho, for the sake of 4/5 short months, and doubling down twice over by stopping playing to force that, now, sadly, never will be.
You could have left on the best of terms mate and been looked upon as a modern-day great.
Instead, you’ve left a terribly sour taste in the mouth that will linger forever in how you’re ultimately viewed by Liverpudlians.
