Philippe Coutinho

[Kenneth]

Counting's best price is potentially post WC. I would keep until then.

But potentially not, one bad or mistimed tackle and he could be worth **** all to anyone.

[Shaggy]

[ame]https://twitter.com/MelissaReddy_/status/948876954173870080[/ame]

[Mello]

1 step forward, 2 steps back always with this club and small time ownership. Silly me for thinking that bollocks about having £150m last summer might be true and the VVD signing showing it. If that bull**** was true we should have like £300m next summer with the additional CL funds. Who wants to bet we don't spend a 5th of that to improve the club?

[Shaggy]

If that report is correct, 'only' £105m up front seems a bit wank.

[Chris]

This is absolutely mad. I can't get the thinking behind it at all, even the figures mentioned are meh, i'd understand more if they lashed Neymar money at us.

There has to be another midfielder coming in and another attacker surely. Just Lemar is not enough and he can't even play CL anyway, we're pretty much conceding defeat in any hope of winning that!

[Phoenix07]

If that report is correct, 'only' £105m up front seems a bit wank.

Like I said before, I don't get where the money is coming from.

1). Nou Camp redevelopment
2). Dembele transfer last summer (£96million, rising to £135million).
3). Bumper Messi contract

[cream]

What do you do with a player willing to down tools and go on strike ?

[Irishnev]

I'd rather keep Coutinho for this season than swap him for anyone

I also see Lemar as a winger rather than a central midfielder. Able to play as a 10 maybe, but which we don't really do anyway

+ he is available for the Champions League, I genuinely think we have a shot of winning it with him and now VVD

[Fuzzy]

I'm struggling to think of a worse outcome of this deal for us.

He'll leave us in the middle of a crucial season where we battle on two major fronts to be Iniesta replacement in the league they've won. How does that make us look? We're showing everyone we're small-time bums who can be extorted easily. And we're not even getting much more than what we'd have to spend on Lemar, who isn't half as good, nor suited to the league, nor playing in a similar role. We're giving up on the potential extra fees that he'd command after a good World Cup. We're showing Mane, Salah and the rest it won't take too much effort to tell us to **** off when they want to. Awful.

As for Coutinho, I hope he does a Torres @ Chelsea and just ends up at Inter in a few seasons, finishing 7th in the league year after year.

[Mello]

What do you do with a player willing to down tools and go on strike ?

Force him to and harm his own career while we would be, at worst assuming he can keep it up the entire season, in the exact same position. But I'm far from convinced he would do that. It's shooting himself in his own foot.

[Exiled_red]

If that report is correct, 'only' £105m up front seems a bit wank.

[Fierce]

If that report is correct, 'only' £105m up front seems a bit wank.

I dunno, most deals are gonna be structured over years, so to get such a chunk up top doesn't seem too bad. Its what the total deal comes to that concerns me more. If its above £130m plus addons its acceptable, any less and our trousers are down

Also agree that selling now is mental for us, and mental for Barca to buy. Surely the sensible option is to secure his price now but get him in the summer. He can't be THAT desperate to leave FFS

And whilst I think a fee of around £130m seems about right (if a tad low in comparison to other fees of late) 3/4 of it on Lemar makes it seem peanuts

[Fuzzy]

Other than us with Torres, which other 'ambitious' club has sold their top player in January? Can't think of one.

[Scratch]

If Barca really are serious about wanting Coutinho, why are they only now "preparing" a deal? Surely the bid should have been ready and gone in on the 1st...all this delay will only harm their chances of getting him this window, same as waiting until the last few weeks of the summer window scuppered their chances.

[Robbie-9-Fowler]

Like I said before, I don't get where the money is coming from.

1). Nou Camp redevelopment
2). Dembele transfer last summer (£96million, rising to £135million).
3). Bumper Messi contract

Sold Neymar for £190m cash