Klopp says he’s excited to have such a big carachter back in the dressing room.
Interesting that... more important than our on the pitch even.
You can see why. This lad’s proper Captain material (*another* one in the team!) His attitude is the thing that astonished me the most when he joined this club. His football ability in midfield didn’t purely because of Babu’s insights into his game when he joined.
The fact he took a lower pay packet to come here and train under Klopp to further his game should have told me about his attitude a lot earlier than I realised. But it was that amazing moment in an after match interview, of a CL game where Coutinho had just owned the field, when the interviewer asks Coutinho about Barcelona. The sheepish magician is clearly under pressure, so Ox buts in and tells the interviewer that it’s an unfair question. The lads loved having Phillippe in the side and just moved the conversation on.
I was thinking about that moment quite recently, as I realised just how big a thing that was. He’s early/mid 20s, an interviewer, in front of *millions* of people world wide has asked an awkward question to a teammate and he’s butted in, taken control of the interview against a very experienced, media professional and very respectfully moved it on. Incredible maturity beyond its years - very impressive.
He really does deserve to be back in before the end of this season to get some medals come what May.
Here’s the interview in question. Brilliant. Just realised, it was actually not a CL game, and it wasn’t the little magician who’d bossed the field, but the very man in question - Ox got the MOTM award.
https://youtu.be/Hd3d3JJVNVE
