“Integrity, loyalty, respect” – Liverpool fans see irony in Philippe Coutinho’s tweet

Reuben Pinder

It would appear that they have not forgiven him for leaving.

Those of you who are attentive and caring to your parents will know that Father’s Day is coming up. The rest, shame on you.

A few days before the occasion, Barcelona and Brazil midfielder Philippe Coutinho posted a good old fashioned sponsored tweet, containing an advert for Hugo Boss, starring none other than Coutinho himself.

The tweet was captioned: “Integrity, loyalty and respect are the great values and qualities my father taught me. What did yours teach you? This Father’s Day, show him how grateful you are for his lessons with.” A touching message, I’m sure you’d agree. Those of us lucky enough to have been brought up by caring fathers will have been taught the same lessons Coutinho mentions. But if you thought there’s nothing in the tweet that anyone could contest with, think again. You clearly haven’t been exposed to ‘Football Twitter’.

Integrity, loyalty and respect are the great values and qualities my father taught me. What did yours teach you? This Father's Day, show him how grateful you are for his lessons with #BOSSunited pic.twitter.com/ddX28we0Z3

— Philipe Coutinho (@Phil_Coutinho) June 11, 2018

Plenty of Liverpool fans picked up on the ‘loyalty’ aspect of the message in particular. The general message fired back at Coutinho was that he could not possible advocate the idea of loyalty because he left their club.

And fair enough, no other player has ever left a football club before to play for a bigger team. Nobody ever leaves a job for a better paid one, where they’ll work around more highly skilled employees. Because it would be disloyal.

Of course, Coutinho did stay at Liverpool for the first half of last season despite asking Jürgen Klopp if he could leave in the summer. He gave his all during those months and was granted his wish in January.

But, looking at it that way would require logic.