The Brazilian national team, historically known for being the best team in the world (winning more World Cups than any other), is once again producing fantastic numbers, which are scaring everyone. After having a catastrophic era between 2010 and 2018 in which they failed in absolutely everything, they have been reborn since the arrival of their current coach, Tite.
A perfectly balanced contest between Barcelona and Sevilla at the Camp Nou on Sunday ended in a 1-1 draw with Luuk de Jong’s early strike being promptly cancelled out by Philippe Coutinho’s first goal for the club since May of 2019.
The meeting between second (Barça) and fourth (Sevilla) in last season’s table figured to be the sternest test of Ronaldo Koeman’s early reign despite the fact that Julen Lopetegui wasn’t on Sevilla’s bench after being sent off in Thursday’s 1-0 victory over Levante.
Preseason results don’t matter, especially so when you’re FC Barcelona playing against third- and second- division sides, but Barça has followed up Saturday’s 3-1 win over Gimnàstic with a 3-1 victory over Girona on Wednesday.
The retooling of Barcelona is continuing at a frantic pace with the firing of Quique Setién and hiring of Ronald Koeman as manager and the firing of Eric Abidal and hiring of Ramon Planes as technical director, but you can’t say that the club’s specter isn’t still haunting this season’s Champions League with former player Neymar and current loanee Philippe Coutinho set to do battle in the final.
There are great goals, crap goals and meh goals. Then there are the goals that are just mean. Philippe Coutinho scored a meh goal and a great goal on Saturday against Werder Bremen, but the middle strike of his hat trick fell firmly in the category of cruel and unusual punishment.
Bayern Munich fell behind early to Bremen but ran away with an easy 6-1 win, with Coutinho netting three. Robert Lewandowski added two, because of course he did, and Thomas Müller joined in on the fun as well.
After a year-and-a-half together at the Camp Nou, it’s likely that Ousmane Dembélé and Philippe Coutinho have ended their time together as teammates on the pitch.
Money is becoming increasingly inflated in soccer over the last five years. It seems like each year a new record transfer fee is set both at a club level and international level. This has been possible thanks to incredible broadcast rights fees in other countries that then trickle down to teams in each league. Teams then have more money to spend on players and clubs take advantage of that, setting ridiculous asking prices for their players as the sponsorship money just rolls in alongside the lucrative TV deals and funding from club owners.
In January of 2018, Philippe Coutinho became the second-richest transfer in soccer history when he moved from Liverpool to Barcelona. Essentially a replacement for Neymar, who had months earlier become the richest transfer ever, Coutinho never really quite fit in, as the impending Coutinho Bayern loan deal illustrates.