Philippe Coutinho remains the third most expensive player of all time after joining Barcelona for £142million from Liverpool in January 2018.
The Brazilian talent had been linked with Barcelona for some time, and Liverpool eventually sold the midfielder for an initial £106m with a further £36m of add-ons organised by Liverpool's sporting director Michael Edwards.
It is believed that Liverpool have now received the full fee for Coutinho, and the money was excellently reinvested in Alisson Becker and Virgil van Dijk.
However, confusion in Spain surrounding the clauses embedded within the deal have led some to believe that the payments are not yet complete.
It's fair to say that Coutinho's move to Barcelona has been close to a disaster, as the Brazilian has never really settled at the Catalan side, and was even loaned out to Bayern Munich just a year after joining from Liverpool.
To make matters worse for Barcelona, Coutinho was part of Bayern's side that knocked them out of the Champions League that season, scoring twice against his parent club to humiliate the Spanish side.
Despite the underwhelming three years at Barcelona, Coutinho is set to be given one more chance by Ronald Koeman, but some Spanish sources still believe that Liverpool could be owed more money for the deal, even though the Liverpool Echo are certain that the transfer has been fully completed.
Sport.es believe that if Coutinho plays 10 more games for Barcelona, the club will be obliged to pay an extra €20m (£17m) as there was reportedly a clause in the deal that would see Liverpool receive a bonus if the Brazilian reached 100 games for the Spanish side.
Do Barcelona regret signing Philippe Coutinho? Comment below
Coutinho has played 90 games for Barcelona, and this target of 100 will likely be reached before Christmas, so the conclusions of a potential clause will be discovered in due course.
However, the midfielder is yet to feature so far this season, but could make his first appearance of the season against former loan side Bayern in the Champions League, after the two sides were drawn together in Group E alongside Benfica and Dynamo Kyiv.
Although they sold their star player at the time, it is under no illusion that Liverpool have benefitted from this deal considerably more than Barcelona, who may regret the move completely.
Barcelona paid £142m for a player that has struggled to excel at the Camp Nou, and Liverpool raised the funds to add a world-class defender and goalkeeper to their ranks, with Premier League and Champions League success following shortly after the arrivals of Alisson and van Dijk.
Coutinho also had to watch his former side produce one of the best comebacks in European history, as the Reds overturned a three-goal deficit against Barcelona to progress to the Champions League final, with the Brazilian left shocked upon his return to Anfield.
The midfielder has been linked with a return back to the Premier League, but will be playing in La Liga until at least January, with Liverpool set to profit even more if reports in Spain are accurate.
