It's heading towards five years since Philippe Coutinho swapped Anfield for the Nou Camp.
In January of 2018, Barcelona made Liverpool an offer that they couldn't refuse for the Brazilian playmaker as they parted company with a whopping £142m to secure his services.
That deal has long been viewed as transformative for Liverpool and destructive for Barcelona, with the Reds re-investing a considerable chunk of their windfall back into the squad with the additions of players such as Virgil van Dijk and Alisson Becker, two players who have been core to Liverpool's successes over the past four years.
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Barcelona, on the other hand, have had to rebuild after the pandemic exposed their financial folly in the transfer market, with major signings such as Coutinho, Ousmane Dembele and Antoine Griezmann failing to deliver for the Catalan club.
Coutinho inked a permanent deal with Aston Villa ahead of the current season having spent the latter part of the 2021/22 campaign on loan at Villa Park, the price tag for the 30-year-old standing at a reported £17m, a fee that was just 12 per cent of what Barca paid to lure him to the Nou Camp initially.
Claims over Barcelona continuing to owe clubs money for transfers have been made for some time now, with deals for the likes of Miralem Pjanic, Frenkie de Jong and Sergino Dest all still seeing the La Liga giants owe money to the respective clubs they acquired the players from. A total of £125.8m (€144m) remains outstanding according to reports to emerge in Spain, via SportBible and others, in recent days.
Among the headline figures owed included Coutinho, with claims made once more that Liverpool were still waiting on an outstanding sum from Barcelona, a remaining £12m (€14m) according to reports.
Barcelona do owe money for that deal, but Liverpool have long since washed their hands of it.
A footnote in Barcelona's accounts for 2019/20 stated: "Liverpool Football Club has factored with a financial institution its right to collection."
What that means is that the Reds sold the remaining transfer debt that was owed to them to a financial institution, realising the cash to hand them some working capital during the financial uncertainty at the onset of the pandemic.
"It is fairly common to have these things done in business," explained football finance expert Kieran Maguire and author of The Price of Football' told the ECHO last year.
"Barcelona still technically owe the money to Liverpool, that is why is shows up as such in the accounts, but what happens is that the money is paid and Liverpool then send that on to the third party who has bought the debt.
"Liverpool have received all the money owed for Coutinho, but Barcelona have not yet paid it all."
While the Barcelona accounts may still highlight monies owed to the Reds, the truth is that from a Liverpool perspective that is a deal that has long been settled.
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