There was a point, sandwiched by Aston Villa’s second and third goals, when Philippe Coutinho decided the game was rather too easy when played in a conventional manner. He decided he was going to backheel his way through a crowded penalty area. He almost succeeded, too.
Perhaps few would have been surprised if he had. A talent has been liberated, a misfit rejuvenated, an object of mockery reinvented as the subject of tributes. Steven Gerrard can be a hard-nosed pragmatist when discussing other topics but a gushing admirer when the focus switches to his flagship signing.
On a night when Coutinho scored the least impressive of Villa’s goals at Elland Road, he nonetheless looked a class above everyone else on the pitch. A catalyst often does. Coutinho is an advertisement for ambition and Leeds, beaten by a team transformed by a January arrival, could wonder if Marcelo Bielsa’s aversion to transfers will come at a cost.
Coutinho certainly did when Barcelona paid £142 million for him. His presence at Villa can feel part of an extended experiment: transplant one of the costliest footballers ever into a decent but otherwise unexceptional mid-table team and see what happens. The answer, it transpires, is a personal renaissance.
Bombed out of Barcelona, revived at Villa, he may be happier alongside Calum Chambers than Lionel Messi. Indeed, when Chambers, not content with the extraordinary, outside-of-the-boot pass that led to Douglas Luiz’s goal against Southampton, curled in a shot from 20 yards, it was tempting to wonder if Coutinho’s influence is turning him into the Messi of Villa centre-backs. Or take Danny Ings’ diagonal ball and Matty Cash’s fine touch and finish: maybe Coutinho is contagious.
The evidence is that a world-class footballer can bring the best from others. “The players are loving training and playing with him, and I’m loving working with him again,” Gerrard said. “If people knew what a humble kid he was and how hard he works and how he is around the place, he’s just a joy to be around.”
Perhaps, given a platform to play and with a team built around him, Coutinho has rediscovered the joy of football. He had lingered afterwards on the pitch he had graced. There was a deft bit of control, drawing defenders towards him, before he released John McGinn to chug into the gap he created and almost score. There was the way he floated into the box to break the deadlock.
It continued a productive return to England.
Coutinho has four goals and three assists in eight league matches for Villa; he is almost their goal-a-game man. It is separated by a four-year interregnum, by spells at Barcelona and Bayern Munich that brought silverware but little love, but he has picked up where he left off in the Premier League. His last 14 outings for Liverpool produced seven goals and six assists. It is artistry and end product. “I know when he is happy and smiling, he can produce performances like that,” said Gerrard.
Coutinho’s comeback came laced with scepticism: not from Gerrard, perhaps, but in the wider world. “I don’t think the technical side of Philippe was ever in doubt,” said his manager. “That is the reason why I was so desperate to get this signing in.”
The ability that prompted Barcelona to pay a sum that puts him behind only Neymar and Kylian Mbappe remains, it is allied with a commitment that James Rodriguez, a comparable player, increasingly seemed to lack in his time at Everton.
If Gerrard has been parachuted into elite managerial roles in part because of his playing career, it has provided him with another advantage: an enviable contacts book featuring superstar footballers who admire him.
He formed part of Villa’s allure to Coutinho. Those persuasive powers may be tested if he is to keep his talisman. Gerrard is understandably keep to keep a player who can elevate Villa to another level.
Either Coutinho would have to take a pay cut or Barcelona would have to subsidise some of his huge wages if Villa are to make the move permanent in the summer. Gerrard is understandably keen to: if Coutinho gravitated to the Nou Camp in a bid to play with the best, he joined a Villa side in 16th. Now they are ninth. It prompts the question of what a magician can turn them into, even as he turns himself back into the player he was.
