Neymar saga rumbles on

Confusion surrounding the apparent pending transfer of Neymar to Paris St. Germain was rife in Barcelona on Wednesday, with the player staying silent on his future.

“Doubts, doubts and more doubts,” ran the headline on the front page of Catalan daily Sport, above a photo of the striker in a pensive pose.

Barca centerback Gerard Pique had sparked panic after appearing to backtrack on tweets suggesting Neymar would stay at Camp Nou.

PSG is trying to lure the 25-year-old Brazilian to France and is ready to pay $256.8 million release clause to make him the best-paid and most expensive player on the planet.

Last week Pique took to social media to say “he’s staying”. However, when pressed on the matter on Tuesday ahead of a friendly in Landover, Maryland, against Manchester United — which Barca won 1-0 thanks to a Neymar goal — he was less sure of himself.

“It’s a personal opinion from the conversation that I had with him and my intuition,” Pique said.

“But it’s not official,” he added. “And it’s not for me to say if he’s going to stay or not.”

Fans in the city were not too confident about Neymar’s future and seemed to be fed up with the whole saga.

“If you are offered double by another company, then you will go,” said Salvador Pons, president of the Blaugrana supporters’ group.

“Even if your colleagues say, ‘no, don’t leave, don’t leave’. Even to France, which is not at the same level as the Spanish league.”

Neymar departed MetLife stadium without addressing reporters after scoring a brace in a 2-1 preseason friendly win over Juventus in New Jersey on Saturday.

“The situation is eroding confidence at the club,” columnist Tomas Andreu wrote in the newspaper Sport.

“What really hurts here is the silence of the player himself, which in the end says a great deal.”

At the same media conference where Pique spoke, Argentine defender Javier Mascherano said he had told Neymar to carefully weigh the pros and cons of a move.

Mascherano added all the players, including Lionel Messi, had spoken to the player to ask him to stay.