Liverpool's Next Philippe Coutinho: The Rise of Erik Farkas
Liverpool may have finally found their new Philippe Coutinho – and he’s already in the building.
For years, the Brazilian’s departure has been framed as a sliding-doors moment. Coutinho forced his way out, the relationship frayed, the exit turned sour. Then came the twist: the fee Liverpool banked for him laid the financial foundations for Virgil van Dijk and Alisson Becker. Two signings that changed the club’s modern history.
Barcelona lost. Liverpool won. And yet, strip away the emotion and the accounting, and you’re left with a simple truth: Coutinho the footballer was a marvel.
He owned that No.10 role. Gliding past defenders, stitching attacks together, threading passes that defenders never even saw. He had that blend of street footballer flair and cold, clinical vision. When he picked up the ball between the lines, Anfield held its breath because something – anything – felt possible.
Wirtz’s slow burn
When Liverpool pushed the boat out for Florian Wirtz, the narrative wrote itself. At last, a natural heir to Coutinho’s throne. A gifted creator, a player who had ripped up the Bundesliga while still barely out of his teens. This, many believed, was the missing piece.
Reality has been harsher.
English football has not welcomed Wirtz with open arms. Where Coutinho settled quickly and lit up games almost on arrival, Wirtz is still searching for his rhythm. He looks half a second off the pace at times, caught between options, not quite the fearless prodigy who dominated in Germany.
The talent is there. Everyone at the club knows it. But unlocking it has become one of the great puzzles of Andoni Iraola’s early tenure at Anfield. Solve it, and his project suddenly looks a lot brighter. Fail, and that signing risks becoming a constant question mark over his reign.
While that conundrum plays out in the first team, something else is quietly taking shape behind the scenes.
Erik Farkas: the new magician in waiting
This summer, Liverpool had two academy priorities circled in red: Joshua Abe and Erik Farkas. Two teenagers, two serious talents, and two players being watched closely by clubs across England and beyond.
Losing either would have stung. Losing both would have been a disaster.
Instead, Liverpool have tied them down. Abe agreed his professional deal earlier in the summer. On Friday, the club confirmed they had reached an agreement with Farkas to sign his first professional contract as well.
For those inside Kirkby, that news matters. A lot.
Farkas is the one who makes people talk in Coutinho tones. The comparisons aren’t lazy. They come from what he does with the ball at his feet. He sees passes others don’t, slips through defences that think they’re set, and plays with a calm, sharp football brain that belies his age.
He has that same love for the audacious through ball, especially with the outside of his foot – a trademark Coutinho used to turn into a weapon. It’s not just showboating. It’s incision, disguise, timing. The kind of pass that breaks a game open.
Watch Farkas on a good day and the word that keeps coming back is simple: magician. He drifts into pockets, links play, then suddenly hits a pass that rips a back line apart. There’s joy in how he plays, a looseness, a sense that he’s out there to create as much as to win.
Liverpool have seen enough to make a clear decision: this is a player they want around for the long term. A player they believe can grow into that creative heartbeat role the club has been trying to refill since Coutinho left.
Wirtz is the here and now, the big-money bet trying to find his feet. Farkas is the one coming up quietly behind, learning, waiting, already carrying the echoes of a Brazilian magician who once lit up Anfield.
If he fulfils even a slice of that promise, Liverpool’s next Coutinho won’t need to be bought. He’ll have been built.
