Kevin Kilbane on Coutinho & Barkley’s Future

During the week there was a lot of talk of Phillipe Coutinho leaving Liverpool as was the case over the summer. We all know Liverpool stood firm and didn’t allow the transfer to go through then and the ball is firmly in their court. Liverpool have been heavily linked with one or two players themselves around Europe but they probably have to get one signing lined up before they’d allow Coutinho to go.

Thomas Lemar from Monaco looks the most likely player to head to Anfield and whether they can get that deal over the line in January or if it’s done in the summer remains to be seen.

There was a suggestion just before the window opened that Coutinho was a done deal over in Barcelona..

..obviously it’s not that clear cut but the Brazilian clearly wants to go move to Spain and spend the rest of his career there. It will be difficult for Liverpool to keep hold of him beyond this window it’s a 50/50 call on whether Liverpool can get someone with Champions League experience like Lemar in to replace him and that will decide fate in this window.

Coutinho’s attitude has actually been excellent in the last couple of months, he wanted to go in the last window, that didn’t happen for him but he came back into the squad and been fantastic since. Klopp made him captain on a couple of occasions and he’s stepped up to the challenge and I admire his attitude between September and December.

Right Time for Barkley to Move
I’m not very surprised by Ross Barkley’s move to Chelsea, I think Big Sam went into Everton with the intention of keeping him but there’s been no real talk of Barkley wanting to stay.

Like Coutinho, it looked like he wanted to go last summer but it fell down because of the injury he’s had..

..but it might be the right time for Ross to go. The young scouser has to be thinking it’s time to get a move on in his career, he’s been at Everton for 13 years since he was 11 and he’s been a good servant for the Toffee’s but I think it’s the right time for him to challenge himself elsewhere.