Magical misfit Philippe Coutinho may have found unlikely home at Aston Villa

Philippe Coutinho has played 598 minutes for Aston Villa, in which time he has scored four goals and set up three more. Victory at Leeds on Thursday meant Villa have won three league games in a row for the first time since the beginning of last season. There is a real sense of momentum there now and it is not just about results. Coutinho, quite aside from his direct contribution, is a player of stature, the sort of figure whose very presence can persuade fans, even other players, that a club is going places. Which inevitably prompts the question: what is he doing at Villa?

It’s probably largely an economic question. As the rest of European football retrenches because of the economic impact of the pandemic, the Premier League’s relentless expansion goes on. The English middle class can afford players who are out of range to all but a tiny handful abroad.

But it’s also a question rooted in modern ideas of what an attack-minded player should be. To create is no longer enough and Coutinho is not a natural presser. His gift is inconsistent; already at Villa he has had one stinker, in the win over Everton. Football is haunted by these castaways left behind by the economics of the modern game: too expensive for all but the absolute elite to own, but too unreliable for the absolute elite to play.

In his second autobiography, published in 2015 after his move to MLS, Steven Gerrard told Liverpool to “treasure Philippe”, saying he could become “Liverpool’s main man and a top player in world football”. But in the last game Gerrard had played with Coutinho, Liverpool lost 6-1 at Stoke. Coutinho’s is a career dotted with major disappointments: Liverpool’s 3-1 defeat to Sevilla, Barcelona’s 4-0 defeat at Anfield, Brazil’s 2-1 defeat to