Respected Spanish journalist Guillem Balague believes Liverpool will keep Philippe Coutinho for this season.

Barcelona set a deadline for Sunday night at 7pm for Liverpool to accept their third bid for the Brazilian; if the deadline was not met then they were understood to have retracted the offer.

Now that the time has passed, Balague says the Blaugrana would now shift their focus to other targets - such as PSG's Angel di Maria.

Balague said: "If Liverpool are to be believed, they won't get Coutinho, for instance, and they will have to go for other targets.

"Barcelona set a deadline of 7pm on Sunday for Liverpool to accept their third for Coutinho," he added. "And that they would retract the offer if it was not accepted.

"Liverpool have not even answered, so that should mean that's the end of that.

"Lodging a sizeable third bid (or who knows, even a fourth or fifth) for Coutinho could help Barca negotiate better deals for other targets, though.

"They may be able offer a little less for their targets now - Ousmane Dembele, Jean Michael Seri and their third target, Angel Di Maria from Paris Saint-Germain."