You can create an account with no phone number during Android device setup.
You can also just get a burner phone number for a few bucks.
You can also just get a burner phone number for a few bucks.
But you have to keep paying the monthly cost, if you loose access to a phone number in your Google account it's game over for any account recovery or "let's verify it's you" it might decide to throw your way.
Yeah now they have IMEI and all the other device specific info anyway they might as well forego the phone number