Analysis: Philippe Coutinho offers up latest Aston Villa box office showing

The playmaker’s latest box office showing at Villa Park set up the biggest win of Gerrard’s reign to date, on an afternoon when his team’s attacking potential exploded into view with a 4-0 thumping of Southampton which wasn’t even that close.

Coutinho was architect in chief, scoring one, creating another and pulling the strings in a fashion worthy of a player nicknamed the Little Magician. The Brazilian’s best trick came seven minutes into the second half. With Villa two up, Coutinho moved half of the visiting team with one swing of his hips before conjuring a finish between the legs of goalkeeper Fraser Forster to kill the match as a contest.

It was a moment which later prompted Gerrard to recall similar acts at his expense when the pair trained together at Liverpool, the cause, he claimed with a smile, of ‘six screws in my left groin’ together with the realisation his own days as one of the Premier League’s top performers might be numbered.

Yet while Coutinho might have hastened the end of Gerrard’s playing days, he is helping his former team-mate’s top-flight management career click nicely into gear. Just seven matches in, his recruitment on loan from Barcelona already feels a masterstroke and early vindication of Gerrard’s judgement.

Many had already written off a player whose star had faded so badly in the four years since his £142million departure from Anfield. But Gerrard always believed Coutinho’s light could be rekindled in the right setting and he has quickly been proven correct.

From the moment the 29-year-old first walked on to the pitch to spark a comeback in January’s 2-2 draw with Manchester United, he has looked at home at Villa Park and the adulation from supporters is only growing. Coutinho has either scored or created seven of the last nine goals Villa have scored in front of their own fans. His substitution with nine minutes remaining prompted one of the loudest standing ovations the ground has heard in years. Triggering the £33million option to buy included in his loan agreement may already be in no-brainer territory.

Gerrard’s confidence in Coutinho isn’t the only area in which the manager’s decision-making is beginning to look sound. Saturday also brought reward for his faith in Danny Ings and Ollie Watkins as a strike partnership.

Within eight minutes, the duo had combined for a goal for the first time as team-mates, Ings finding Watkins before the latter deftly spun Jack Stephens before lifting his finish over Forster’s outstretched glove. Douglas Luiz, a player who has struggled for form in recent weeks but kept the support of his boss, then slotted home Coutinho’s first-time cross to double the lead and score for the first time in more than two years.

After Coutinho had cast his spell for the third, Ings capped off the afternoon by ending his own seven-match goal drought. The striker declined to celebrate out of respect for his former club but the reaction of his current team-mates said plenty about the importance of the moment to a player who has largely endured frustration since joining in a £25m deal from the Saints last summer. For Ings, more than anyone, Saturday felt like a big step in the right direction.

If there was a criticism of Villa it was they did not win by an even greater margin. Coutinho, Ings and Watkins all failed to score after going clean through, the latter pair admittedly denied by fine Forster saves. With slightly sharper finishing, Coutinho might easily have scored a hat-trick in the five minutes prior to half-time.

Gerrard, ever the perfectionist, also took issue with his team’s sloppiness on the ball when four goals to the good. This was the second week running Villa have won despite seeing less than 40 per cent possession.

Clearly, there are areas to work on but the bigger picture is of a manager who has ridden out the first mini-crisis of his tenure in impressive fashion. Players booed off just a fortnight previously after losing so despairingly to Watford also deserve credit for the manner in which they have responded to their manager’s very public wake-up call. A team which has not always been the most resilient coped well with the disruption caused by the loss of Ezri Konsa and Lucas Digne to positive Covid-19 tests. Calum Chambers, who replaced Konsa in the heart of defence, made a strong case to keep his place even if the latter is available for Thursday’s trip to Leeds, helping create Villa’s second with a deftly lofted pass into the path of Coutinho.

The fresh challenge for Gerrard’s team is continuing the upturn. They are yet to win three in a row this season but should they achieve it at Elland Road would climb into the top half of the table. What equates to a realistic target over the run-in is difficult to determine, yet the gap to eighth-placed Wolves is now down to seven points from 13 two games ago and Villa, with a game in hand, still have to visit Molineux next month. If nothing else it is a useful carrot and should Coutinho continue to sparkle, pretty much anything will feel possible.