I remember the hype around him at the time, people talking about him being the next super star for Barcelona. Why didn’t he do well at Barcelona?
Was always a one trick pony…also barca never played a 4231. Am.is where he’d make the biggest impact
Too shy
huge price tag pressure, and his playstyle was not suited to Barcelona’s tiki-taka oriented style. He immediately did well at Bayern because they are more similar to the Liverpool he used to play in during his best years.
Afaik it was Valverde playing him at left wing instead of his natural position.
Pressure
Messi was better and played his position
Couldn’t justify his price because of pressure
He did well for the first season. He was confident. But after an injury he started losing it.
He plays in the same spaces as Messi. Like Greizeman. A dumb signing.
That Barcelona era was truly lost
No he doesn’t, he literally plays on the opposite side
Correct. Messi usually goes right and Countinho left.
Neither were true wingers at the time though, both were more of a mix between a winger and a 10, filling the same spaces, but on opposite sides. Neither had good work rate, which makes it hard to have both play together.
He was a highlight reel attacking midfielder who never did much defending, and was not a consistent performer. That works fine in a top 4 liverpool team, but got exposed when he was played as a midfielder at a huge team like Barcelona. Additionally, the game has moved away from luxury players like him and Ozil. Current attacking midfielders like Odegaard, Bernardo Silva, Maddison, and KDB all press hard and have positional awareness.
Messi was there and no one was allowed to play good and take the aura from him.
Downvote me now… good night.
Coutinho is a good player but he’s not as amazing as the hype made him out to be. The price was way too high. Even at Liverpool, he wasn’t as amazing as fans made him up to be. He was okay in most games but every 3 or so games, he’d produce some bit of magic.
From a Liverpool fan: coutinho is good for having that great goal or chance created. In between that he isn’t going to do too much. Barcelona is built to have possession and control. He’s just not a great player in that style. He’s mainly effective on a team that lacks offense and needs that one guy to make something happen.
That money helped Liverpool buy Alisson and Van Dyke, money well spent!!!
Another interesting thought. Didn’t Neymar eagerly want him to join Barca and then left before it happened? Coutinho was a great player. It was Barcelona who started to fuck up.