I find it hilarious that there's this kurt guy who lives in his bedroom with a joystick is making up crap like "I admitted I don't watch football" when I'm one of a handful of guys that participate in PL, Liga, Ligue1, Bundesliga, CL, EL threads, "other leagues" and also Libertadores shit if that's on. But sure, feel free to make up shit, but I'm also free to shit on your stupidity for trying to be a wisecrack with every evidence against you.
As for Coutinho himself, he had rejected Manchester United in the summer.
Other than Inter and 2 other Serie A clubs, Arsenal, Liverpool and Newcastle approached Barcelona for him. All offers with the exception of Newcastle, and obviously Aston Villa, were rejected. I'm pretty sure they all had something in mind for him when they had this intention to sign him.
City and Chelsea don't need to sign him, but if he was on his roster he'd be seeing significant minutes from guys like Ziyech, Havertz, Hudson-Odoi, Grealish, Sterling, Pulisic, Mahrez or Gabriel Jesus who played a lot on the wing this year... If City had him, this also means that Aston Villa doesn't really have this much money, since they wasted all that on Jack fucking Grealish!
But suit yourself into thinking that they never wanted him in the first place.
I love it when I'm being attacked by a bedroom troll when my job pretty much was handling finances and investments of sports related people... most of whom were based in the UK even
You think I wouldn't be watching if any of my business assets were playing a game and being in immediate risk of losing their future income, which my own income depended on?